


Born to Be Drabbles

by Berserker88, JackofMinds



Series: Born to Be Wilde [2]
Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Almost Entirely This Time, Animal Abuse?, But also, By the way reptiles, Bystander Syndrome, Child Abuse, Comedy, Destructive Romance, Drama, Family Drama, Free Pie, Gen, Hell with it a lot of the tags from Born to Be Wilde, If you don't know them why are you here?, Jewel Heists, Lying Cake, Mind Games, Original Characters - Freeform, Poorly-made Public Attractions, REALLY Unsubtle Parodies, Read that first guys, Shell Games, Surprise Relevance, Therapeutic Therapy, Therapeutic Wrestling, Toaster Safety Tips, Unsubtle Parodies, borscht
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2019-07-26
Packaged: 2019-07-27 06:35:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 45,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16213475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Berserker88/pseuds/Berserker88, https://archiveofourown.org/users/JackofMinds/pseuds/JackofMinds
Summary: A oneshot collection of the various moments, characters, and subplots that couldn't quite make it into Born to Be Wilde. How much more trouble can these guys get up to? You have no idea. Main story spoilers abound. Open to requests.





	1. Cold Open

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to our worst-kept secret among certain circles, this is Born to Be Drabbles!
> 
> This idea was the result of Mind Jack and I repeatedly going "I wish we could have seen this character more" or "Dang, if only we could have expanded on that." Indeed, there are numerous examples of moments that we would have liked to include in Born to Be Wilde, but couldn't due to pacing and story constraints.
> 
> The solution is this: a collection of drabbles (or oneshots really, but 'Born to Be Oneshots' just doesn't sound as good) that delve into the various characters and settings of BtBW. We will show moments spoken of, but not seen, within the main story, along with totally new content just for fun. Think of it like the deleted scenes of a movie; you certainly don't NEED to read these to understand the main story, but it's a nice supplement.
> 
> That said, there's a certain expectation that you are not reading this until you've at LEAST finished the Lang Family arc (chapters 11-15). Certain revelations from said arc will be mercilessly spoiled in these drabbles, including this first one. And if you're a future reader, you're probably better off just catching up on the whole fic before even touching this. You have been warned. Please note that, as drabbles, these will be significantly shorter than the average BtBW chapter.
> 
> Cover image by the extremely-talented Aseka Red Velvet Panda. I get a little giddy seeing Jimmy and Carla depicted so wonderfully. I know you're probably not reading this, but thanks anyway!
> 
> That about "covers" it. Enjoy the stories untold. :)

**Drabble 1: Cold Open**

_Tundratown_

_Koslov's Palace_

_8 : 43 PM_

Koslov was a simple mammal with simple desires. In his opinion, there was nothing wrong with that.

The heavily-built polar bear, huge even for his species, was known in two different circles. He was the owner of a popular borscht restaurant on Fleet Street, but he was also the head bodyguard of Tundratown's crime lord, Mr. Big. Most mammals he met were only aware of one side of him, though he made little effort to hide the other. Again, he was a simple mammal. He did not see the point.

Tonight, he was the former, but would soon be the latter. The restaurant closed at 9: 00, which meant business was quickly winding down. Soon after, he would lock up and head to the compound of Mr. Big, where he would resume his other job. Only one customer remained, and as Koslov's few employees had already left, he would have to take care of it himself.

As soon as the guy decided to get off his phone, that is.

Koslov leaned against the kitchen door, looking out over the dining area. The Palace was, as to be expected, simplistic in design, with seats and tables arranged for most efficient service, a distinct lack of frilly decorations that he personally saw as just a waste of money. You came here to get borscht. If you did not want borscht, you would not come. Why were there so many who didn't understand that?

"Evening, Peggy, how's my favorite trash panda?" asked the customer, a sharply-dressed fox leaning back in his seat with a phone to his ear. "Wait, is that a slur? I always forget if that's a slur. Anyway, I'm just having a bite to eat across town before we get down to business. Are you busy?"

Koslov did not know if this 'trash panda' was busy, but  _he_ certainly was. He locked eyes with the fox and pointed to the clock. He had no problem serving someone after-hours, but only if they actually ordered before closing time. Otherwise, he would have even less problem tossing him out on his tail.

The fox seemed oblivious, but Koslov knew he was just ignoring him and growled under his breath. "Good to hear," he continued. "Then do me a favor and give me a quick run-down on what you've learned about our VIP." He rolled his eyes. "Yes, now would be good, thanks."

Koslov's large foot tapped as the fox went silent for a while. "Interesting. And what about the girl? Anything to worry about there?" He started tapping his claws on the table, as if he weren't being obnoxious enough already.

"Crazy like a fox?" He saw a large smirk spread across the vulpine's face. For whatever reason, he seemed to find that immensely funny. But Koslov was not laughing. He glanced up at the clock himself. 8:47. At this point, he almost  _hoped_  this conversation would last until 9. He could use the stress relief.

The fox suddenly looked right at him, with an expression somewhere between concern and amusement. He didn't even know such an expression existed. "You don't need to do much of anything. I've already pulled some strings and I can guarantee you the boys won't give you any trouble. So whenever you're ready, just walk right in and do your thing. Once you meet up with our mutual friend, just be sure to give him a special Tundratown greeting." Koslov had no idea what he was going on about and he was quickly losing any interest he had. "Well,  _of course_ it's going to work. It's my idea."

Another look at the clock. 8: 48. He was starting to suspect the cold weather had frozen the clockwork.

"Oh, there is  _one_ more thing," the fox said, his tone darkening. "You haven't forgotten about my son, right? I'd like to think  _you_ of all mammals wouldn't lose sight of our goal, but I just want to have all my bases covered." As soon as he'd heard what he wanted, he perked right up again. "Nah, that's all I wanted to call you about. Good luck and enjoy your meal."

By some divine mercy, he finally ended the call. Koslov chose to waste no further time. "Are you ready to order?"

The fox looked at him like he forgot he was in a restaurant, which tried his patience even further. "Sure. I'll have borscht."

Koslov glared. "All I make is borscht. Be more specific."

He made a big show of thinking it over, even putting his fist to his chin. "Hmm...I'm leaning towards the red kind."

"With beetroot?"

"Is beetroot red?"

He gritted his teeth. "Yes."

"Then I'll take that."

"Traditional then." Koslov turned and headed into the kitchen. He couldn't believe he had waited so long for this. Even heating up the pre-made stock took him a few minutes longer than he'd wanted to spend here and fresh was out of the question. He should've just thrown this nutjob out, but there was a sense of pride in maintaining the rules of his establishment, even if that meant having to endure a little.

He soon brought a steaming hot bowl of borscht out to the fox and set it down in front of him, not bothering to stick around as he walked away again. "Much obliged," he said, lifting a spoon to his lips to taste it. "Hey, this is actually pretty good."

Koslov stopped. " _Actually?"_

"I was just curious how committed you really were to this whole borscht thing," he said as he took another, purposefully loud, sip. "But I can see now that you've really got a passion for it. Perhaps even more than your other job."

He just snorted a little. "So you know."

"I know many things, most of which are a lot harder to come by," he chuckled, gesturing to the chair across from him as he continued eating. "Come on, don't be a stranger. Have a seat."

"I  _am_  stranger."

"You mean you don't recognize me?" The fox pouted pitifully. "Funny, I thought our last encounter would have left more of an impression."

Koslov paused.  _Did_  he know this fox? He certainly wasn't a regular customer, which meant he would most likely know him from his other line of work. He'd certainly seen his share of foxes through Mr. Big's employment, but most of them didn't make it out of the office again at stable body temperature. The only exceptions he could think of were Nikolai and...

It couldn't be.

"You...you are John Wilde?" he asked hesitantly.

"Is that so hard to believe?" The fox smiled at him in bemusement. "And I go by Count Reynard now, FYI."

Koslov took a seat, still towering over him. "You are different."

"I suppose I am," he said, glancing down at his suit. "It took me decades to look  _this_ good." He kicked a long cane up into his paw, turning to point it at him. "But  _you,_  Koslov, haven't changed a bit I'm afraid."

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, narrowing his eyes threateningly.

"Well, when I last saw you, you were working for Mr. Big and making borscht. What do you do now?"

"...I work for Mr. Big and make borscht."

"See?" Reynard noted, returning his attention to his soup.

Koslov crossed his arms stubbornly. "I have no need to change. Job is fulfilling."

"Is it?"

"Yes," he growled. "My borscht is result of many long years of work and refinement-"

"I'm not talking about the borscht," Reynard interrupted, waving his paws. "I mean your role as a supposed 'bodyguard' for Mr. Big. How fulfilled can you really be doing nothing?"

"I do  _not_ do nothing!" he roared, slamming a fist onto the table. The result was Reynard's borscht flying up and splattering all over the bear's chest.

The fox winced. "Oooh, tough break. Looks like you could use a new suit."

Koslov barely even glanced at the stain. "I have others."

"So let me ask you something," Reynard said, clasping his paws together. "How often do you actually have to  _protect_  him from anything?"

"What?"

"It seems to me that with Mr. Big's highly-secured compound and squad of polar bear enforcers, the chances of  _you_ personally having to come to his aid are rather slim. Am I wrong?"

Koslov frowned, his expression wavering slightly. "...You are not."

"Then what exactly do you do? Because it kinda seems like your job is just to stand there and look menacing. When you're not ferrying Big around like some furry taxi service I mean. You must have to be pretty delicate to avoid hurting him, huh?"

"Yes."

"Hmm, I can't say you really strike me as a 'delicate' mammal," Reynard observed, reaching over to grab one of the bear's beefy arms and giving it a small squeeze. "I bet it's tough having to control your strength sometimes, to resist the urge to just clasp your paws a liiiiiiiitle bit tighter..."

"I am deeply loyal to Mr. Big," he scowled. "I would not dare hurt him."

"Really? My mistake then." Reynard shrugged and sat back in his seat, making no further comment as he looked idly at his phone.

The silence quickly grew unbearable. "Why do you think I would hurt him?" Koslov finally had to ask.

"I just thought you would find it unfair," he explained, still focused on his phone. "Unfair that a mammal so powerful should be rendered so powerless. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if mammals even mistake  _you_ for Mr. Big every now and then. Must sting having to correct them."

"I am content with my job," he snapped, somewhat defensively. What kind of nerve did this guy have to come into his establishment and question his life choices?

"Content? Interesting word choice." Reynard put the phone away, looking back at Koslov expectantly. "Not exactly the same as 'happy' or 'satisfied' is it?" Koslov remained silent. "Tell you what, how about I give you a little test? To see how much you  _really_ like your job."

"How could you possibly prove such a thing?"

He casually lifted a finger and pointed at the empty borscht bowl left on the table. "Bring me two more of those."

Koslov blinked in confusion. That was the last thing he would have expected. "You want borscht  _now?_ Two bowls at that?"

"No, no borscht. Just the bowls."

"...You want me to bring two empty bowls?"

He mimicked his accent. "Da."

Koslov turned and looked up at the clock. 8: 56. "It won't take long, I promise," Reynard said from behind him. "Besides, isn't setting a good career goal worth all the time in the world?"

Begrudgingly, Koslov pushed himself up from the table and headed into the kitchen, returning with two empty bowls that he laid out in front of him. "Here."

Reynard grabbed the two bowls and turned them over onto the table, then withdrew a small coin seemingly from thin air, flipping it up and down on his thumb. With his other paw, he reached over and grabbed the remaining bowl. "Do you know how this game works?"

"I'd rather know why you're playing games in first place," he growled. "My patience runs short, fox."

"Don't worry, it's simple, just the way you like it." He flipped the coin up into the air one last time, then caught it in the bowl and slammed it down onto the table with the other two. "I shuffle the bowls around and then you tell me which one you think the coin is under. Savvy?"

"This is complete waste of my-"

"Good. Now keep an eye on the birdie…" Reynard's paws started moving a mile a minute, shuffling the bowls around at such a speed that normal mammalian eyes could hardly follow it. All the while, he kept staring at Koslov, that same, smarmy smile on his muzzle. "Now, now, don't look at me. You want the coin, right?"

Figuring he might as well play along, lest he got himself into this mess for nothing, Koslov did his best to keep track of the bowl the coin had been under. When Reynard finally stopped, he pointed over to the one on the left. "That one."

The fox lifted the bowl, revealing it to be empty. "Bzzt! Wrong! Care to try again?"

Koslov took a deep breath before nodding slowly. If this fox wanted to play games with him, then play he would. Play and win.

Reynard lifted the rightmost bowl to reveal the coin again, then started to shuffle them. Koslov trained his eyes on the bowl he wanted like it was injured prey and followed it back and forth. Smiling to himself, he chose again...and chose wrong. "What?!"

"Tough luck there, friend. But third time's the charm right?"

The third time didn't go any better. Or the fourth. Or the fifth.

"Yikes, hate to see that happen."

"He shoots, he misses."

"Ooh, that one's gotta sting."

"ENOUGH!" Koslov barely held himself back from hitting the table again, pointing sharply at the central bowl. "I  _know_ that was coin! What are you trying to pull here?"

"Hey now, don't be a poor sport," Reynard smirked. "Just be glad you're not gambling over this."

Koslov looked back at the clock, realizing he was almost ten minutes late closing up. All because he had let himself get distracted by this stupid game. "Keep your lousy coin and get out!" He emphasized his point by sweeping a giant paw over all three bowls, sending them to the floor where they shattered to bits.

"Now why did you have to go and make a mess?"

"I'll clean it later. Now…" He glanced down at the pile of porcelain for just a second, but it was long enough to notice something. Or rather, a  _lack_ of something. "Where is coin?"

"Hmm? What coin is that again? I have so many…"

Koslov reached over and grabbed Reynard by the front of his suit, easily lifting him into the air. He shook the fox up and down, dislodging a familiar coin from his sleeve. "You keep me here after hours just to  _cheat me?!"_

"No, I kept you here to demonstrate something."

"Demonstrate  _what_?"

Reynard smiled, gently patting the paws that could easily tear his head off. "Three things. First, when you are challenged in any capacity, you seek to prove yourself. Second, you greatly value your physical strength and the power it brings you."

"And what is third?" he asked, baffled by the fox's complete lack of fear.

"The third…" He shook his head pitifully. "Is that you have too much pride to let yourself be made a fool of, even here in this empty restaurant with no other witnesses. Which makes me wonder, why exactly do you continue to work for Mr. Big, defying all of these traits that make you  _you?"_

"It is complicated." He roughly dropped the fox back into his seat. "You don't understand."

"Actually, I think I understand pretty well," Reynard replied, dusting himself off. "It's the only option you see open to you, it pays you well enough to make a living, it allows you some degree of satisfaction even if you're not completely fulfilled. Am I in the ballpark?"

"You're one to lecture me," he scoffed. "As I recall, last I saw you, you were groveling to Mr. Big for favor."

"That was then, this is now," Reynard replied, unfazed. "Complacency, Koslov, that has been my biggest mistake. But I am no longer willing to settle. I will fight for what I desire, no matter the cost." He leaned across the table, smiling up at the bear. "You've seen what this change has done for me, now what about you? Will you remain stuck in this borscht-filled hole you've dug for yourself, or are you ready to show this city what you can  _really_ do?"

Koslov looked at him, closely. It was hard to deny how much his demeanor had changed. The fox that sat before him now exuded an unbreakable confidence, to such an extent that even he had been unable to put a chink in that armor. He thought he was happy now, but how much happier could be become? How much better of a mammal? "...What would I have to do?"

"Ah,  _now_  you are asking the right questions," Reynard grinned. "I'm pleased to see you still have some fight in you after all. In exchange for your honesty, how about I let you in on a little secret?" He looked back and forth, despite knowing full well they were alone, and whispered over to him. "After tonight, let's just say Mr. Big is gonna get a whole lot smaller."

"What?" Koslov's eyes widened. "You mean to say you intend to-?"

"This is what taking action looks like, Koslov, and I don't have time to waste. You're not the first one of his bears I've talked to, you know. There's a number who would rather take orders from a mammal who at least reaches up to their knees."

Koslov struggled to keep his composure, breathing heavily. But did he react this way because he feared for his employer...or was it something else? "Who?"

"I'm not going to spoil the surprise  _that_ much. What fun is that?" He laughed, getting up from his seat and gently pushing it in. "But you should be aware that a friend of mine is going to stop by the compound later, a friend with a very...particular set of skills. When he does, you're going to have a choice to make." He turned around and headed for the door, twirling his cane.

He couldn't lose this chance. "Wait! What choice?"

Reynard stopped in place, one paw hovering over the door. "That's the beauty of it. Either you do what you  _think_ your job is, or exactly what Mr. Big has been having you do all this time.  _Nothing."_

With one final smile and wave, he pushed himself through the front doors and disappeared, leaving Koslov alone. The bear looked up at the clock one final time. He was now almost a half-hour late for duty, even more by the time he got there. Somehow, he felt no need to rush.

After all, Koslov had always been a simple mammal with simple desires.

But maybe it was time that changed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another shoutout to DarkFlameWolf for being our beta once again.
> 
> For this first drabble, what could be more appropriate than how it all began? Reynard's phone call here is the same one Simon gets at the start of Chapter 1, and quite a bit more revealing on his end. It takes a special kind of confidence to arrange an assassination plot in the vicinity of the victim's head bodyguard before even bothering to recruit him.
> 
> Koslov was also fun to write, and in response to some comments wondering why he turned on Mr. Big, I hope we've provided a good answer. You may even get to see the critical moment in a future drabble…
> 
> Not sure when the next one will come, so let us know how much you like this idea. And if there's certain characters or events you want more detail about, feel free to make requests as well. We only have a handful of these things actually planned after all. ;)
> 
> (You know, I think we're breaking some kind of rule when a "drabble" is longer than the first actual chapter.)


	2. In Dire Straights Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I said I would stop talking about gaps between updates, so I won't. Just...it's been a bit. XD
> 
> But while I'm working on a certain project that is also not a very well-kept secret, it's about time you guys got some more BtBW content, even if not an actual update to the main story. Just a little something to whet your collective whistles again, starring two characters who have just recently become relevant again. (Well, "recently" in a certain manner of speaking, but again, not going into that.)

****

**Drabble 2: In Dire Straights Part 1**

_Dire Family Residence_

_8: 52 PM_

The Rainforest District was flooded with the largest full moon that the city had seen in years. It was so bright that even mammals not of the night could easily see. But in the backyard of a small trailer, at the foot of a freshly dug grave, one wolf's sight was blurred with tears.

Junior's masculinity forced him to struggle against the tears, but it was no use. He couldn't help but whimper and cry like a pup who had lost his mother. Which, in a sense, he was.

His older brother had clearly been working out his grief in different ways. The head of the shovel used to dig the grave was visibly dented from the force enacted on it while a nearby tree had a divot in its wood that looked suspiciously like a fist. Felix Senior had used a black-on-yellow road sign of a howling wolf to mark the grave, and while the brothers did not own a stake driver, the sign had been thrust almost halfway up its post into the hard dirt.

He opened his mouth, but struggled to speak. "Hi, Momma…uh…" What did you even  _say_  to someone in a grave? It wasn't like he hadn't been to wolf funerals before. The Lang Family was uncontested in the Rainforest District, so they didn't lose mammals often, but it did happen. Junior loved his brothers and sisters, but this was different; this was his momma. The one who had rescued the Dire brothers from that house of horrors they had lived in for most of their puphood. The mother who had raised them like they were her own, giving them a massive new family.

Growling in frustration, he punched the ground. He winced, cradling bruised knuckles. Just then, a memory sparked in the back of his mind. The night he had first met Lady Lang, his paw had been injured.

Sighing through his nose, he gave up on speech for the moment, letting memories take his thoughts away.

* * *

_Old Dire Residence_

_9: 13 PM_

The force of the fist in his jaw carried the small wolf pup across the room, slamming into the wall and leaving a wolf-shaped divot in it.

Junior cowered down, holding his paws up to cover his face. The much larger wolf grabbed his right paw and bent it backwards, making him scream. His father's breath stank of alcohol. Ironically, he wore a wifebeater, though the little ten-year-old had never seen his mother hit. In fact, she beat her pups just as much as her husband did.

"Think you can do that to me, you little punk?" The father Dire hissed in his son's face. "Think you can embarrass me in front of my friends!?" He shook the pup violently by his arm and a slight crack could be heard as something broke.

"I'm sooooooorrrrrryyyyyy!" Junior wailed. "I didn't mean to spill it! I-I just thought you might want lemonade…" He had honestly been trying to make his father happy so that something like this might not happen tonight, but had slipped on a puddle of spilled vodka, spilling the drinks all over his father in the middle of a poker game. He knew no one was coming to help him. Everyone knew what his father did. They were still in the other room, laughing and talking.

Suddenly, the pressure was lifted from his arm as his father was knocked off of him. His older brother rubbed his own sore knuckles. Despite being only fourteen, Felix was only a foot or two shorter than their father. He was malnourished, but still quite bulky with muscle.

Felix was on his father before he could rise again. "Don't! Hurt! My! Brother!" Every word brought another fall of his fist. This had happened too many times and Felix had very obviously snapped. Junior had never seen him so angry. His eyes were narrowed, his lips drawn back to bare his fangs. His shoulders were tense as fist after fist slammed into their father's face.

"Felix Dire Senior! Stop that this instant!"

Junior's heart filled with dread as their mother yelled. For a brief moment, he had hoped that Felix could win this fight, but there was no way he could fight off both of them.

The skinny wolfette rushed across the room to pull her furious pup off his sire. Her ribs were clearly visible and Junior could practically see the drugs running through the veins on her bloodshot eyes. Felix cast a pleading look at Junior. ' _Run.'_

Junior ran. He went to the living room closet. It was small, but the door was sturdy and would keep them out until they decided he wasn't worth chasing. As he locked the door behind him, all he could do was whimper, cradling his broken paw and listening to the sounds of violence outside his small shelter.

"You little  _bastard!_ Gonna disrespect me like that! I'll…!"

_Knock knock knock!_

"Oh, for the love of…" There was the sound of the door being flung open, ending with the bang of the doorknob hitting the wall. "We don't want to buy any-! Oh! Uh...Lady Lang! What are you doing here?"

"Frederich. Ariana," a polite, feminine voice greeted. "I'm here to collect payment. You're well overdue."

"Eh, you know you can just call me Fred, right, Miss Lang? A-And you didn't have to come here personally to collect. I coulda sent the money over the phone."

"Oh no, my dear Frederich. You misunderstand. You see, I don't take kindly to being stolen from and a little birdy told me that  _someone_  has been running a side operation on my territory. You've been stealing parts from the shops and selling them for your own gain. On top of that, you have been attempting to stir dissent against me in the pack. Frederich, you did not honestly believe that no word of this would reach my ears? You betrayed me, and the rest of the pack is very unhappy. I have to make an example of both of-" The voice stopped suddenly. "...I was not aware you had pups." Her tone seemed to be casual interest, but Junior could sense an undercurrent of something else. Something like his parents when they got really really mad.

"Y-yeah! We do!" Their mother spoke up quickly. "We just did it to make extra money for them!"

"Oh  _really?"_  Lady Lang asked coldly. "And I suppose that the little one in the tattered clothes, bleeding on the floor, is prime evidence of this?"

"Him? Oh, he fell. Isn't that right, Felix?" Junior could picture his mother's forced grin at this. He trembled like a leaf about to fall from a tree, just trying as hard as he could to not let out a single noise.

There was a silence. It seemed like minutes to the terrified pup, but in reality, was just a few seconds.

"Is that true, Felix?" Lady Lang asked softly, gently. "I am your alpha. I can guarantee you that no harm will come to you."

There was a silence. Junior's heart was pounding in his chest.  _The alpha is in our house!_ This was bad! This was really bad! In school, they said that in the old days, wolves would be punished for disrespecting someone higher up than them in the pack. If she found out that they had disrespected their parents, who knew what she would do?

 _ **Bang! Bang!**_ _Thud. Thud._ Felix screamed.

Junior tensed. His breathing became shaky. Even one so young knew the sound of a gunshot. She...she must have shot Felix…

"Are you alright, little one? What's your name?" Lady Lang asked.

Junior's breath caught in his throat. She knew he was here. She must have smelled him. He tried to move, but his muscles were locked in terror. He couldn't move.

"I...you...shot them…"

Junior's heart skipped a beat. That was Felix! He was alive!

Slowly, he opened the door, just a crack. A small amount of light came into the dark closet.

Lady Lang stood over Felix, who looked up at her with what seemed like speechless awe. He could not see his parents. The older wolf wore a dark gray business suit with a periwinkle shirt, moon-shaped earrings, and high heels.

"Yes, I did. I had to. Scum such as them have no place in the pack."

Someone out of Junior's view coughed awkwardly. "Uh...we're just gonna…"

"You stood by and watched as our pups, the future of our pack, were tortured and abused." Lady Lang said with an almost unnatural calm, not even looking back at their father's poker buddies. Without turning, she lifted her gun and fired four more shots before it clicked on empty.

A voice trembled and stuttered, trying to find speech. "Ou-wha-huh-I...I'm alive! You're out of ammo!"

Lady Lang strolled calmly out of Junior's view.  _ **Crack!**_

Junior saw his brother wince and knew that the final wolf had just met a very nasty end.

Lady Lang stepped over to the still prone Felix, whose instincts finally made him scramble back until he hit the wall.

"Shhh, darling… it's okay." Junior watched as the pack mother knelt in front of Felix. Her voice was soft, like before, but… a different kind of soft. Junior didn't realize that he was leaning forward curiously...until the old closet door let out a loud  _creeeeeeeak!_

Lady Lang's ears pricked. She whipped around towards the noise. Junior yelped in surprise, scrambling back into the darkness of the closet. He heard her footsteps drawing near to his hiding place. The door creaked open again as the female wolf knelt down in front of him. He could see that she was quite pretty, with steely blue eyes and light white fur. She had a comforting smile on her face. "Come now, little one. Don't be afraid." She reached out a paw to him, causing him to flinch away, covering his face with his paws.

"I-I think it's okay, Junior!" Felix called out. "I think she's safe."

Lady Lang did not speak. She simply sat there with that same smile, waiting patiently for Junior to come forward. Slowly, but surely, he did. He took her paw, and she gently helped him to his feet. She did not, however, bring him out of his hiding place. "Wait just a moment. It's…a bit of a mess out there. A pup should not have to see something like this." Her face morphed into a sad frown as she looked over towards Felix, who did not make an audible reply, just moving to brush past her and hug Junior. He gently scratched between his brother's ears in an attempt to calm his fear. "You aren't quite reacting the way most would," Lady Lang remarked.

He shrugged. "I can't say I'm sad," he replied simply. "Plus, you saved us. Why would I be afraid?"

Lang paused. "Just…normally someone so young would have a stronger reaction to…well…"

He gave her a flat look, still cradling Junior's head and guarding his gaze. "I've seen worse around them."

Normally, Junior would have objected to being held like this, but…he really  _didn't_  want to see what was out there.

She tapped a few times on her phone, then put it to her ear. "Morty? I'm going to have to order dinner for seven. With takeout for three." Junior's ears pricked. Was she ordering from Burger alpha? He wasn't very hungry and he didn't think now was the best time anyway. A weird memory stirred in his head, some wolf yelling something in the street before he got arrested. What was it? "Burger alpha is mammals?" Junior couldn't remember exactly what it was. He shook his head, clearing the odd thought.

Lady Lang sat with them in the closet while they waited. No one really said anything for a little while, until she broke the silence. "So…what is your real name, Junior?"

Junior flinched. "Um…Felix…"

Lang nodded, turning to Felix for an answer.

"He wasn't talking to me," Felix deadpanned. "We're both Felix. He's Felix Junior."

The alpha wolf had been stunned before. Now she just seemed like she was at a loss for words. "But…why?"

Felix shrugged. "Ask them." He jerked his head out towards the living room.

"You are one dark child, aren't you?"

Felix shrugged.

"And you shrug a lot."

Felix shrugged.

"Feelie's bad at talking to girls," Junior murmured quietly.

Felix cast him a disapproving look. "Hush, you." He noogied Junior a bit, causing him to squirm and give a tiny smile.

Lady Lang grinned. "Feelie, huh?"

Felix rolled his eyes. "You hush too."

Junior gasped. "Feelie! Be nice to the alpha!"

To his surprise, Lady Lang burst into a loud, cackling laugh. "I think I like you, Felix."

"Which one?" they asked.

"Both of you."

* * *

_9: 36 PM_

After a little while, Junior heard a car pull up outside. "One moment," said Lady Lang, rising to her feet. "I'll be right back."

She closed the door behind her as she left. Junior whimpered a bit as the closet went dark.

"Good evening, Morty."

"Evenin' Miss La- Aww heck! What the-!?" A male voice stammered and swore outside.

"Hush. There are two pups in the closet."

"What  _happened_  here?! Dinner for  _seven?!_  Do you have  _any_  idea how hard this is gonna be to serve?!"

"I have some idea. Recall that I did your job before you."

"Shit, what the hell did they  _do!?"_

"Child abuse."

"Ah, shit…"

"My sentiments exactly. Now get to work. And my takeout?"

"Sitting outside. Here's the keys and the cover."

"Cover?" Felix whispered, seemingly to himself.

After a few minutes, Lady Lang opened the door. Her suit, shoes, and earrings had vanished. She now wore an indigo shirt under a black vest, with blue denim jeans. On her chest was a gold badge. "You're a cop?" Felix asked incredulously.

Lady Lang winked. "Nope. But no one else has to know that. Come on, our ride is outside."

They followed her outside. Surprisingly, there was no one there. Their parents and the poker buddies had vanished, leaving nary a trace. Junior really didn't want to think about what had happened to them. He was just glad to be alive.

Outside their trailer was a black and white motorcycle with two sidecars. "Hop on in, little ones." Lady Lang offered.

* * *

_9: 40 PM_

The trio sped down the dirt back roads of the understory. It was after dark and the light of the full moon filtered gently through the trees around them. Felix snoozed fitfully in one of the sidecars, seemingly unable to keep his eyes open after the stress of the evening. Junior sat on his knees in the other one, hanging his head over the side and letting his tongue flap in the wind.

Lady Lang stifled a laugh as she tried to keep her eyes on the road. "Careful, Junior. Don't want to bump your head on something."

"Awwwww…" Disappointed, Junior plopped back onto his rear, giving a childish pout.

"Be nice to Miss Lang, Junior." Felix muttered, despite never having opened his eyes. Junior responded by sticking his tongue out at him now.

Felix finally looked at Lady Lang. "So what happens to us now? Our parents are... gone, and we don't exactly have anywhere else to go. Where are we going to stay?"

"With me, of course," Lady Lang answered with zero hesitation. "I consider all members of the pack my children. That includes both of you two. I have a couple of spare rooms at my home. You can have them."

"You've been a better momma in the past hour than they ever were!" Junior piped up to assure her. His tail was wagging a million miles an hour. Not only were they escaping their bad parents, they were being taken in by the alpha herself! This was the absolute best thing that could happen in his life!

Felix gave her an odd look. He didn't look as trusting as Junior was, but his shoulders sagged and his muzzle dipped submissively. "Yes, ma'am."

Lady Lang ruffled his headfur with one paw, somehow managing to steer the motorcycle with only the other one; a feat Junior found AWESOME! "Don't worry, Felix. I understand if you don't trust me fully at first. You didn't have a choice but to trust me when I came in, and I can understand being cautious after what you've been through. But I promise that I will do my best to be  _far_ better a parent than them."

Felix hesitated, but gave a satisfied nod. It wasn't like things could get any worse, after all. Junior knew his brother wouldn't let anything bad happen to them.

The trio sped down the moonlit road as the city lights began to blink out.

* * *

_The Suckier Present_

_8: 53 PM_

Junior slowly came back to the present, finding himself on his knees, forehead pressed into the dirt. His crying had long since stopped. He simply had no more tears in him to cry.

He slowly pushed himself to his feet, his numb legs creaking in protest. He didn't really feel anything anymore. He felt… tired. He felt helpless. It was hard knowing his brother was once again in the line of fire while he was crouched in the backyard, sobbing like it was the end of the world. It might as well have been. He had no idea what to do next.

…

Scratch that. He had a pretty good idea on what to do next.

Junior shambled slowly back inside, stopping at the fridge to pull out an old bottle of wine. He had bought it for his momma, intending to give it to her as a birthday present. She collected old wine and this was a pretty rare one, supposedly quite valuable.

Hopefully, that meant it was also really good for getting piss stinkin' drunk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good evening, everyone!
> 
> HAHA! YOU THOUGHT IT WAS BERSERKER88 WRITING THIS, BUT IT WAS ME! DIO! I MEAN MIND JACK!
> 
> Bah. Curses. My lovely surprise author's note, ruined by anime yet again.
> 
> Anyway, yuppers. I finally wrote an actual chapter! I had a reason for vanishing this time! (As for why this took so long… *Cough* Laziness *Cough* Also writing other stuff too.)
> 
> This is the first of two Drabbles featuring the Dire Bros. I don't know if that's the Drabble that will be appearing next. Gotta talk that over with Berky first. (Berky: It's not.)
> 
> Alrighty. I think that's all I've got to say. So, for now, (It feels so good saying this again.)
> 
> Until we meet again…
> 
> Mind Jack, OUT!


	3. Girl's Fight Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the spirit of keeping these drabbles related to whatever's going on in the main fic, here's one about Carla and Priscilla! (Carlilla? Priscarla? Whatever the shippers come up with.)
> 
> Warning: Disproportionate amounts of fluff in this drabble, especially compared to that last one. As someone who doesn't write much of it, it may be a little jarring.

****

**Drabble 3: Girl's Fight Out**

_The Docks_

_Boardwalk_

_A Happier Time_

"I can't believe your familia kicked us out."

"I can't believe we're on a  _date."_

It had been twenty years since the Rodentriguez family took in its largest guest and her impact was hard to ignore, quite literally. Elizabeth already had a large house by rodent standards, but having Carla around meant upgrading to what would equate to a Beaverly Hills style mansion, then tearing down a few walls and raising the ceiling just to make a single bedroom. As their kind required much less than most mammals, it wasn't too unreasonable of a purchase, though it did necessitate bringing in a little extra dough.

That was where Lucha Libre came in. Carla was the first to become a wrestler, her aggressive and domineering instincts perfectly suited to the profession. It was her way of giving back to the family that had raised her, many of whom came to watch her fight (and win) day after day. They were nothing but supportive of her new calling, which they kind of had to be since there was no way they could ever do the same.

It was no wonder then that she and Priscilla got along so well. For the many, many,  _many_ awkward days Carla spent struggling not to step on her siblings, let alone relate to them, Priscilla was the only one who showed no fear in approaching her. Even most mammals her own size found Carla a bit intimidating, and that was  _before_  she started cracking skulls for a living, yet here was this girl roughly the size of her foot not caring in the slightest. Priscilla Rodentriguez could talk to a rhino as easily as a rat and refused to take shit from either. They were like an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object and somehow the result was kinship. But  _romance?_ That was out of the question, right? Different species, different weight class, same sex, talk about a trifecta of abnormality.

The rest of the family sure didn't seem to mind, seeing as how the two of them were basically forced out of the house and told to "get to know each other". Well, there was nothing normal about this situation anyway, so might as well give it a shot, if only because refusal felt uncomfrotably like admitting defeat. "Where are we going?" Priscilla asked, dressed in a casual white t-shirt and jeans while sitting in what was more or less a booster seat. Carla owned an SUV, or rather Elizabeth did, on the condition that it be able to fit literally the entire family to go on field trips.

"Some boardwalk down in the Docks," Carla answered, steering the vehicle with one paw and resting her legs on the dashboard. She had on a dark blue tank top and black pants, also casual. "Just opened up apparently."

"That sounds nice," the rat said shortly. Neither wanted to admit how awkward this night had become already.

"Si, should be fun."

"I think so too."

"Indeed."

"Absolutely."

"No doubt."

They couldn't hold it back anymore, looking to each other almost in unison. "Carla, do you really think we might…?"

"...actually start dating?"

They both burst out laughing. _"As if!"_

They pulled into their stop soon after and left the car, Priscilla jumping and rolling to the ground instead of using the installed ramp. Carla quickly scooped her up and placed the rat on her shoulder. "Hey, I can walk just fine on my own!"

"It's gonna be busy. If something happens to you, your madre will kill me."

She scoffed. "Please. Anyone gets too close and I'll kill  _them_  first."

"No,  _I'll_ kill them before you even get the chance."

"Then if nobody ends up dead, we'll call this night a success. Deal?"

"Deal."

It would be a more difficult goal than either of them expected.

The boardwalk itself was nothing impressive, just a low-budget, barely-put-together mishmash of fabric and machinery, all situated on wood that should have given way years ago. But hey, it would do for a night's entertainment.

"Where do we even start?" Priscilla asked, even a rat disgusted by the atmosphere.

"Hard to pick. There's just so many  _great_  choices." Carla looked slowly back and forth, trying to see through the thick crowds. "They've got some games over there. Want me to win you a prize?" That was a thing you did on a date, right?

Priscilla smirked knowingly. "Sure. If you think you can  _manage it."_

Carla was only half-interested before, but now she was making a beeline towards the nearest stand, a typical carnival game about throwing bottles at stacks of balls. Wait…

"Ah, customers!" greeted a seal in a striped shirt, another ball balanced perfectly on his nose. "Step right up and test your skill!"

Carla slammed down a few coins. The desire to win a tacky prize for her date filled her with determination. "Bring it on."

A row of bottles were set in front of her. The hyena deftly lifted one and wound her arm back, closing one eye as she steadied her aim. Priscilla leaned in, her own beady eyes watching closely.

Carla's arm whipped forward and the bottle went flying...just glancing the top of the first stack and shattering against the wall. "Ooooooh, so close!" the seal said, putting on the usual fake sympathy of a professional.

Carla glared at the stack of balls as if it had personally affronted her. Another bottle was thrown, this one missing entirely. "This game is rigged," she huffed.

"You just need a little more focus," Priscilla offered, hopping down onto Carla's arm. "Take a deep breath and follow my lead." She slowly moved the arm up and into position, aiming carefully. "Okay, toss now."

Carla nodded, moving her arm straight back and throwing the bottle. A direct hit! The first stack exploded in front of them. "Ha! No one has enough balls to stop us!"

Priscilla was already adjusting for the second stack. "30 degrees right, 50 degrees up, and...fire!" Just like that, another stack was destroyed. Only one remained.

"Better pick out your prize." Carla grinned, eyes narrowed on the final stack.

"Annnnnd...fire!" Once more, it was a direct hit...but this time the balls did not fall. Only the bottle was broken. "Negativo. Didn't go in. Just impacted on the surface."

"Must've been a dud." Carla frowned. There was only one bottle left now.

"Then let's make this one count. Fire!" Carla threw again, even harder this time. The bottle knocked a single ball loose, but the rest of the stack didn't budge.

"Too bad!" the seal proclaimed, shaking his head, and his personal ball with it. "Better luck next time."

Priscilla glared at him accusingly. "Nothing takes two wallops from us and stays standing. This  _is_ rigged!"

"No one likes a sore loser," he replied, a bit too smugly for her taste.

Carla glanced down at the seething rodent and decided it was time to return her favor. "Oh, we haven't lost yet. We still have one more to toss."

He scanned the counter, confused. "Hmm? Where?"

"Right here!" Carla reached for the ball atop the seal's head, grabbed the whole seal instead, then hurled him into the last stack. Whatever he had used to keep the balls stuck, he just as effectively got them  _un_ stuck. The impact brought down not only the stack, but the entire stand, leaving only the counter intact. "How's  _that_  for focus?"

"Your aim has improved," she said wryly. "Do I still get a prize?"

She chuckled, gesturing to the pile of junk left behind. "Take your pick."

"Yay!" Priscilla leapt gleefully into said junk.

Her choice of prize was unusual, yet somehow appropriate. Carla now found herself walking back through the crowd with a rat in a capitan's hat standing on her nose. "Hard to starboard! Bring us around! Now drop anchor!"

She stopped in place. "Priscilla, we're just two friends hanging out at a boardwalk, we are  _not_ a ship."

Even for a children's size hat, it was still a little big on her. "You're just jealous because you don't have a prize yet. Let's see if we can change that." She pantomimed pulling out a telescope and looking through it as she searched the area. "There! Land ho!"

"Come one, come all! Test your strength against Grizz the Wizz!" A bear in a cheap mockery of a wrestling uniform had set up an equally cheap ring in the middle of the boardwalk. A nearby sign announced a $500 prize for anyone who could defeat him, not that the sign was really needed when he wouldn't shut up about it.

Carla snickered at the sight. "I think we were kicked out of New Mexicow to get  _away_ from Lucha Libre."

"It's not Lucha Libre," she insisted, pointing to the bear's chubby face. "No mask."

Carla couldn't help an amused smirk at her partner ( _wrestling_ partner). "You really want me to tango with that pendejo?"

"No, I said it's  _my_ turn to win a prize now. Be right back!" Without waiting for the inevitable protest, Priscilla hopped off of Carla's snout, jumping from head to head to reach the ring.

Carla sighed, slapping a paw to her forehead. So much for keeping Elizabeth's daughter out of trouble. Even so, she very much doubted she was  _in_ trouble either.

Oblivious to the coming storm, Grizz continued shouting. "Come on, isn't anyone mammal enough to take me on?!"

"I will!" Priscilla entered the ring, still wearing the hat.

Grizz took one look at her and scowled. "Is this some kind of joke?"

"That's more my partner's area, but I can try. You hear the one about the bear who walked out of this ring with all of his bones intact?" She cracked her tiny knuckles. " _Me neither."_

The next minute or so was filled with screams of agony and unsettling cracking noises. The gathered crowd watched this unfold, horrified, except for a hyena with a small smile on her lips.

"H-Here you go," stammered the bear's manager, an overweight walrus, handing (flippering?) a small envelope to the even smaller champion. "Please don't come again."

"Gracias." Priscilla curtsied, leaving the crumpled mat of fur in the ring as she headed back to Carla. It was a longer trip the second time since her previous stepping stones had now cleared the path. "Here, buy yourself something nice."

Carla took the prize reluctantly. "How am I supposed to top 500 bucks?"

Priscilla adjusted her new hat, which now looked significantly less impressive. "Sorry, guess I can't help but turn everything into a competition."

Carla glanced around, smiling slyly as a solution appeared before her. "Then let's get competitive." She jabbed a thumb over at the bumper cars.

They exchanged wicked grins, then quickly rushed over. The line that had been stationed there mysteriously dispersed as soon as they came near, leaving a nervous otter in glasses who was legally obligated to stay. "I'm s-sorry, but you must b-be this tall to r-ride." He pointed a shaky claw at a nearby sign, depicting a narwhal's horn marked like a measuring stick.

Priscilla said nothing, just pointed back at the bear still struggling to stand again. "I think I can handle it."

"Right you are!" He smiled forcefully. "Come on in!"

Carla picked a red car for the two of them, sticking Priscilla into the front of her shirt. The other participants already seated soon wished they weren't. As soon as the signal to start went off, Carla slammed the gas and charged straight at the nearest target, a young rabbit who would never come here again.

"FOR MY FAMILIA!"

"FOR APPEASING PRISCILLA'S FAMILIA!"

The rabbit was slammed back into the wall and properly traumatized. "About face! Charge!" Priscilla commanded. The car whirled around and sped at the rest of tonight's victims. The first was a fox who was knocked backwards into a deer, who then ricocheted off the wall into a cougar, who was sent spinning back towards Carla just as she charged into him, literally ramming him through the guardrail, out of the rink, and over the side of the dock.

A clever beaver attempted to sneak up on them from behind, but it was him that was surprised when Priscilla leapt at his face. Spinning out of control, he ended up taking out a few more cars before crashing himself. Carla finished up with a ram she was repeatedly battering into the wall, then swooped by to pick her up again. Knowing they were next, the remaining drivers mustered their courage and came at them all at once.

The screams of the slaughter would echo across the boardwalk for decades, but aside from that there was no prize to be won, so they soon called it quits. Carla climbed out of their burnt and twisted wreckage of a car, still carrying Priscilla. "Ayyyy, that was fun! What should we do next?"

Quite a few things actually.

They got on a rollercoaster, after once again coercing the worker to let Priscilla aboard. His concern was justified, since the first thing she did was tie a string around her waist and jump out the back, using a paper bag to stay afloat while Carla held her like a kite. It was a pretty good time up until Priscilla had to hurl.

They watched a pair of fire dancers perform in front of a crowd. Unimpressed, Carla caught a baton mid-drop and proceeded to put it out in her paw pads. Not one to be outdone, Priscilla then attempted to put it out in her  _mouth._  To be fair, it was still more impressive fire blowing than the dancers could pull off, but she would never eat hot peppers again. Their challenge level had been surpassed.

They entered a haunted house, both trying to act tough, but secretly scared out of their wits. This resulted in them both being even more on-edge than usual, and in the midst of teasing each other to cover up their own fear, one of the hired paws dressed as a monster made the mistake of jumping out at them. This triggered a fight or flight response, and since neither was about to run away, they decked the monster and tore the place apart in the midst of beating down the rest.

Priscilla was starting to notice a pattern. "...Maybe we should just try the ferris wheel next."

Carla looked back over her shoulder. There were several injured mammals and busted attractions left in their wake, even a small fire or two. "Yeah...that might be a good idea." It was as if the entire boardwalk breathed a collective sigh of relief.

The ferris wheel didn't go too high, ruining any thrill they might have gotten out of it. This left them no choice really but to sit back and relax.

"Wow, what a night." Carla sighed, leaning back in the cramped gondola as it slowly, very slowly, carried them around.

Priscilla simply leaned on Carla. "I know, right? What a riot! Almost literally."

"Can't have everything." She shrugged. "Speaking of, any idea what Elizabeth was expecting from this?"

"Probably a ravenous make-out session at least."

"Shame to disappoint her."

The rat flipped herself over. "Oh? What do you mean by that?"

"J-Just that it's not going to happen is all," Carla said quickly. "I mean, come on, I'd probably eat you by accident if we tried something like that."

Deciding to have some fun with this, Priscilla wiggled her eyebrows. "Or you can eat me on purpose…"

Carla gasped. "What kind of sick fantasies are you in to?!"

"No, I didn't mean...it's just an innuendo."

"A what?"

"Nevermind." Guess that was one style of comedy Carla would never grasp. "But you're right, there's no way we could ever do anything like that. Can you even imagine trying to snuggle? I'd get lost!"

"And how would we have romantic dinners together? Just put a giant slab of meat next to some cheese?" Carla cackled back.

"Seriously! And let's not even get into that whole 'dominance' thing! We both know who'd come out on top there!"

"Ha! Yeah, that's a no-brainer!"

They both shouted in unison. "Me!"

A few seconds passed as both parties realized this conversation had just gone to a very dark place from which there was no return.

Priscilla slowly narrowed her eyes. " _Excuse_ me?"

Carla leaned towards her. "I meant what I said. Female hyenas are practically  _bred_ for dominance!"

"Only because all of your males are complete debiluchos! Have you  _seen_ how many siblings I have to deal with on a daily basis?"

"Big deal! All I have to do is threaten to step on someone and they fall in line!"

"Well you won't be stepping on  _me!_ Ever!"

"Is that a challenge?!"

"Only if you're tough enough to accept it!"

"GAME ON!"

Priscilla shouted a war cry and launched herself at the hyena. Carla flew back and hit the wall of the gondola, making the whole thing sway violently. Completely disregarding this, she quickly grabbed the rat with both paws and slammed her into the floor. "Still think I can't be on top?!"

"Only on top of the dirt!" Priscilla managed to wrap her small arms around one of Carla's fingers and punched her straight in the knuckle joint. The sharp pain made her hiss and loosen up just enough for the rat to slip out.

By the time Carla regained her focus, she was no longer anywhere in sight. "Wha...okay, Priscilla, there's nowhere to hide! Just come on out!"

"No problemo!" In this brief time, Priscilla had climbed all the way to the ceiling of the gondola, hanging by the beleaguered supports. And now she was plummeting straight down, landing an elbow strike to the back of Carla's neck. Already thrown off-balance, the hyena fell to the floor, allowing Priscilla to grab her ankle and twist it up over her back. " _Rendición!"_

Carla hissed, claws scratching the hard ground, but refused to submit. "Never! You think (agh) I can't (ack) take this?!"

"Oh, I know you can." A devious smile crossed her lips as she wrapped her legs around Carla's ankle, conveniently freeing up her arms. "But can you take  _this?"_ Her tiny claws set to work, raking up and down the sole of Carla's foot.

Her eyes widened. "GAH! NOT FAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAIR!" She thrashed around, trying in vain to shake the rat off.

Priscilla maintained a death grip, continuing the assault. "All's fair in love and war, and we already established this ain't love!"

Laughing hysterically, even for a hyena, Carla rolled around back and forth into each side of the gondola with extreme force. This completely failed to dislodge Priscilla, but  _did_ dislodge the support beam. Laughs turned to screams as they both plummeted off of the ferris wheel and towards the boardwalk below.

*CRASH*

The impact left a gigantic crater in the boardwalk, which the other patrons gathered around to mourn and take pictures.

There was another great splash as Carla popped back up from under the water, Priscilla riding atop her head. The rodent smiled weakly. "I think this means I win."

They didn't get to argue about it further only because the angry voices above drowned them out. This would have been a terrible tragedy had they died, but because they both survived, with barely a scratch at that, everyone else was just pissed. Objects were thrown and obscenities shouted at the two mammals who had left a path of destruction through this land of fun.

"I think we probably shouldn't come back here," Carla said, swatting away a large fry.

Priscilla caught a soda can, then threw it back to protect the environment. "Agreed."

The grey head of a porpoise suddenly emerged from the sea between them. It was no chance encounter, as he stared coldly at the two of them and said, "The Codfather is always watching."

Even they knew better than to stick around after something like that. A few minutes of frantic swimming later, they both crawled out onto shore, panting. "No make-out session...but at least we both got wet," Priscilla noted.

"Huh?"

"Right, definitely gotta avoid innuendoes with you." Priscilla stretched out into the sand, trying to relax, yet again. "We should probably call it here, huh?"

"Probably." Carla flopped down next to her. "But seriously, what  _are_ we going to tell Elizabeth?"

"We can tell her our first date was a success."

Her head shot back up. "Was it?"

"Well, the point of a date is to bond and get more comfortable around each other, right? We  _do_ have a lot in common. Like being tough, and fun, and brave…"

"...and a total menace to society?"

"Now you're getting it!" she cheered. "And I'm  _pretty sure_  no one died either, so I'd say this was a perfect ten on the dating scale. And I'll fight anyone who says otherwise!"

"Huh. I guess you're right…" The idea of dating her best friend was still something Carla would have to get used to, but she was certainly up to the task. "Then you wanna do this again sometime?"

"As long as it's not here, sure."

"Excellente." Carla finally stood back up and dusted the sand off of herself. "Then do you think someday, the two of us…"

"...might be married?"

They both burst out laughing.  _"As if!"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now you know why we don't write fluff. It inevitably turns to chaos.
> 
> After all this alluding to what Carla Hyenandez used to be like back in the good ol' days, now you finally get to see it. Less angry, more funny, just as destructive. Also probably the closest we're ever going to come to crossing the border into M territory here, at least in terms of sexual content. Good thing Carla doesn't get innuendos, huh?
> 
> No, there was absolutely no foreshadowing towards a certain narwhal and his organization here. What are you talking about?


	4. Operation Snake Beater

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With Simon lying unconscious on a warm, grated floor, what better time is there to go into his backstory? This drabble takes place during the fabled "Cold-Blooded War," which we have treated very casually so far despite it confirming the existence of both sentient reptiles and a major armed conflict in Zootopian history. To be fair, casually dropped bombshells are the most fun.
> 
> And speaking of bombshells, let's genre shift and turn this into a war story! Don't expect much of a tone shift though. It's still us.

**Drabble 4: Operation Snake Beater**

_Giraffrican Jungle_

_Outer Heatin'_

_2300 Hours_

War.

War never changes.

But it sometimes got very silly.

Elite Delta Fox mercenary Simon Charles Maskovich was leaning against the side of a plane's hold, impatiently drumming his claws against the metal surface. After a while, even the high altitude and the enormity of the mission that awaited him faded into a dull hum. Right now, he was just impatient to get the show on the road.

He came fully prepared, of course, suited up in a full uniform of brown/green camo gear, a small, concealed handgun, a less concealed assault rifle, a combat knife, several grenades, emergency medical supplies, and a cute little beret. It was Karen VanDal, his commanding officer, who suggested that last one, saying it gave him more "character." He was going to need all of that he could get once he touched down.

Simon never thought the Cold-Blooded War would take him so far from his homeland of Zootopia, but the Scalies were playing increasingly dirty in their efforts to take that homeland from him. Their own home, the Sauriat Union, was a bitterly cold piece of rock in a state of perpetual winter, which posed a bit of a problem for a class of animals who were vulnerable to low temperatures. To circumvent this, the city was powered by what they referred to as an artificial sun, and what the rest of the world more accurately called a giant heat lamp. It provided all the warmth the city would ever need, but they weren't satisfied with that, seeking to expand their territory into warmer lands so as not to be imprisoned by their own climate.

It was to that end that Sauriat military footholds began popping up all over the place, some more dangerous than others. One of the most pressing was a large fortress established in the middle of Giraffrica by serpentine commander Big Boa. It was known as Outer Heatin', where soldiers would always have a place to be warm and toasty. Rumor had it that Big Boa was working on some kind of secret weapon, but their last agent sent in, one White Fox, had been captured before she could tell them much of anything. So now it was up to Simon to swoop in, rescue White Fox, and stop whatever the hell the Scalies were up to all by himself.

Sometimes, this job was just too easy.

His earpiece crackled, the piercing sound making him wince. It was a firm reminder that he  _wasn't_ going to be by himself as Karen's voice came through. " _Ready to roll, agent? As usual, we'll need to establish code names before entering enemy territory. For this mission, you will refer to me as 'Major Pain.'"_

He smirked. "I think I can manage that."

" _Don't laugh too hard now._ Your  _name will be 'Hot Fuzz'."_

His smirk vanished. "That's a rather...suggestive code name."

" _Don't flatter yourself, Hot Fuzz. Now you better get ready. You've almost reached the drop point."_

He tried his best to ignore it. "I've  _been_ ready. The only intel I've gathered so far is the number of bolts on the inside of this hold."

" _I just hope you can-"_

"714."

" _I just hope you can put those observational skills to better use down there, because here comes the drop now."_

Simon was already putting his helmet and parachute on. It was all he could do to keep from flinging himself out of the plane prematurely. At the pilot's signal, the raccoon opened the doors, letting in a sudden rush of warm wind. Taking a deep breath, because even with his experience there was nothing fun about a TAILO jump, Simon spread his arms and leapt out of the hanger, falling through the back of the plane towards the dense jungle below.

The wind whipped against Simon's face as he plummeted downwards. The fall itself wasn't that scary anymore, though there was always the slim chance that his parachute would fail to trigger and end his mission before it even started. That was the only fear he had, if only because he knew Karen would never shut up about it at his funeral. He did  _not_ want to be remembered as the jackass who became a splat in the middle of the jungle.

Reasonable odds were with him though, and after disentangling himself from a tree or two, Simon's feet touched down on the grassy landing with no further issues. After getting his bearings and making sure the coast was clear, he called Karen before she could beat him to it. "I'm in."

" _Nice landing, Hot Fuzz. Might want to take a second and make sure you didn't get a splinter anywhere...unpleasant."_

"I'm fine," he grunted. "Guess you would know what having a stick up your ass is like."

" _Shut up. Now then, you should be about two miles from the main base of Outer Heatin'. You've got a bit of a walk ahead of you, so I would get moving unless you want the Scalies putting a bullet through your thick skull."_

"Delicately worded, as always." She was right though; he had a job to do. He couldn't afford to lollygag.

Simon pressed himself up against the nearest tree and peered around it cautiously, waiting a few seconds before he started to move. He remained low to the ground, doing his best to blend in with the surroundings despite his contrasting fur color. He also made sure he was adequately covering his tracks. Raccoon footprints were fairly distinct, and he would never be so foolish as to leave one out in the open. His senses heightened to the max, he remained focused and ready to react if anything was even remotely out of place.

It was with those senses that he noticed the tripwire. Barely visible in the jungle heat, it was only Simon's keen eyesight that picked it out in time to safely step over it. He paused, half-expecting a land mine on the other side, but when he remained in one piece, he continued onward.  _Sloppy. I'm too close to the base for such a pathetic trap. What are they up to?_

He asked Karen just that. "Major Pain, I'm not getting much resistance, and that itself is pretty suspect. What's going on here?"

" _Maybe they just didn't expect such a brave, handsome warrior of death to come dropping in."_

"Bullshit. They already caught an intruder. Shouldn't that warrant a bit tighter security?"

" _Well, between you and me, White Fox is not what I would call an impressive show of force. They'd be better off replacing her with a robot."_

"Harsh. I'll have to tell her sister you said that."

" _Don't you dare."_

"Hold that thought." Simon leapt onto a nearby tree as the ground suddenly gave away, revealing a concealed pit trap with sharpened stakes lining the bottom, then jumped to the other side. "You were saying?"

" _I'm detecting an enemy campsite ahead."_

"That's what I thought."

It almost came as a relief when Simon finally saw enemy guards. Two appropriately-named monitor lizards were keeping watch over a small campsite, consisting only of a few tents, a stack of ration crates, and a bulky truck. They were dressed in dark red uniforms that clashed in an amusing fashion with their green scales, forked tongues sliding in and out of their mouths and scenting the air. Simon crouched behind the bushes, slowly positioning himself downwind.

"Hmm?" one of the slimy creatures spoke, his Sauriat accent thick and raspy. "Thought I smelled something."

"I don't smell anything," the other replied. "Other than your breath, that is."

It was a good thing Simon was well-versed enough in their language to mentally translate, even if the bored chatter of stooges was rarely worth the effort.

"Must have been my imagination," the first guard said. "I do feel a little asleep."

"I feel asleep too. I need rested."

His translations weren't always perfect either. Simon waited patiently to survey the campsite, making sure that these two lizards were the only ones on duty before he made a move.

"I can't believe Big Boa called everyone else back. Now it's just the two of us."

 _Maybe guard chatter_ can  _be useful._ He casually raised his rifle, poked it through the bushes, and sniped both of them in the space of a second.

Then he called Karen. "I've cleared out the enemy campsite. Two hostiles standing guard, both neutralized."

" _Two whole hostiles?! Congrats, champ! Anything useful?"_

"Just a bunch of tents and supplies, and a big truck. I'll go check it out."

" _You do that."_

Simon stepped over the corpses of the two lazy lizards and took a look around. Digging through the leftovers like any true raccoon, he found plenty of food rations, some ammo, the latest volume of  _PlayBoa,_ and a couple medkits, but nothing that screamed "key item." Finally, he climbed into the back of the truck, almost out of desperation at this point. This whole excursion was starting to feel like a waste of time and he needed to get  _something_ of value out of it.

The truck's back door slammed shut behind him.

_Not exactly what I meant, but at least it's something different._

He tried to lift the door open again, but it remained firmly shut, a hard clicking sound confirming that this was no accident. Someone had locked him in.

"Major Pain, we might have a problem here."

" _Let me guess: you got locked inside the truck?"_

He frowned. "How did you know?"

" _I kinda saw it coming as soon as you brought it up. Think it's a trap, or just unfortunate timing?"_

"Considering I left two dead lizards outside, probably the former."

" _Shit. Can you see any way out?"_

Simon was nearly tossed off his feet as the truck shifted into gear beneath him. "No, and even worse, the truck have started to move."

" _What?"_

"Ugh, sorry. Was listening to those guards for too long. Call you back when I get out, assuming I'm not being tortured or something."

" _...Be careful."_

As the call disconnected, Simon considered his options. He did have a few grenades on him, but he was more likely to blow  _himself_ up in this confined space. He could lie in wait and just open fire as soon as the door opened, assuming they weren't expecting that and would have a much larger force prepared, in which case he would quickly become Hiss cheese.

 _Maybe if I throw a grenade and_ then  _open fire..._

Fortunately, he didn't get the chance to enact this plan, for the truck came to a sudden stop, this time succeeding in knocking him over. By the time he got back to his feet, the door was open, and no one was there. Confused, Simon slowly exited the vehicle, wielding a grenade in one paw and his assault rifle in the other.

One look at his new surroundings told him that he was now inside the compound of Outer Heatin' itself. It was a large, seemingly empty room made of almost pure metal. All the better for its residents to warm themselves when sunbathing wasn't an option.

A little embarrassed, Simon put the weapons away, but remained on guard. "Major Pain, I-"

" _Are you okay?! What did those monsters do to you?!"_

He was no longer on guard. "Um...nothing. They seem to have just locked me inside a big empty room."

" _Oh."_ Her usual tone returned quickly. " _I guess you weren't worth the cell space. What do you see, Hot Fuzz?"_

Simon climbed on top of the truck to get a better viewpoint. "Not much. A sealed door, a few columns, that's about it."

" _Maybe it's a stealth suit ambush and there's secretly a whole platoon in there with you."_

"I hope not. Those damn chameleons were such a hassle last time." He made another sweep of the room. "No, I don't see any conspicuous shimmering. I think I'm alone in-wait. How long was that box there?"

" _Box?"_

"Yeah, there's this cardboard box that just appeared. It must have been hiding behind one of the columns." Simon narrowed his eyes as it slowly slid  _back_ behind one of the columns. "Great. At least now I know who I'm dealing with."

Simon hopped down from the truck and quickly pursued the box, finding it still sitting behind that very column. It made no further movements as he stared it down, not that he was fooled for a second. "I know you're under there."

"What do you  _mean?_ I'm just a  _box,"_ said the box.

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I  _am."_

Simon had no idea how long this exchange could go on if he continued in this fashion. So instead, he brought the conversation to an abrupt end by pulling out another grenade, arming it, and tossing it directly on top of the box.

"Oh,  _shit!"_

The explosion destroyed any functionality the former box still had as a tool of stealth. Unfortunately, its occupant was slippery enough to escape the same fate, and as Simon watched the dust settle, a figure emerged from within.

He was a king cobra of a dark grey color, with black bands running across his scales. Several belts of equipment and weaponry were wrapped around those bands, which did little to hamper his movement speed, nor did the knife-like blade attached to the end of his tail. Around his head was a black bandanna, slightly oversized so that it wouldn't be too tight when his hood was expanded, as it was at this moment.

Simon wasn't particularly happy to see him either. "Hello, Cobra."

Compact Cobra was the Sauriat Union's most valuable mercenary and special-ops agent, which spoke of the low standards they must have had for such a position. Simon had crossed paths (and knives) with him on more occasions then he cared to count, and this time, he had  _almost_ gotten the drop on him if not for his strange obsession with storage containers. "Simon  _Maskovich,_ we meet  _again_ on the  _battlefield."_

He also had a very particular manner of speaking, and he was pretty sure it sounded just as odd to the Sauriats. "Stop talking like that."

" _Like that?!"_

"Look, I don't have time to play with you today. So tell me where you're keeping White Fox and what you're planning, and maybe I won't make you into a new purse for my CO."

Cobra smiled, his deadly fangs poking through. "Tough words, but nothing I  _say_ could prepare you for  _Metal Shell!"_

"Metal...Shell?"

" _Metal Shell!_  A mechanical tortoise with the  _power_ to launch shells from any location!" he boasted. " _Nuclear_ shells!"

"That's stupid. But also dangerous, so I guess I do have to kill you now." Simon withdrew his combat knife and slid into a defensive stance, the blade brandished in front of him.

"Then let us do  _battle!_ You won't  _walk away_ from me  _this time!"_ Cobra did the same, his fangs bared and his hood fully unfurled as his knife tail raised behind him, ready to strike.

Feeling pragmatic, Simon whipped out his handgun and fired a few shots. He had underestimated how well Cobra knew him, for the snake contorted his body to the side to avoid every bullet, dropping to the floor and charging him at blinding speed.

Simon needed the knife now, raising it to parry the rapid strikes Cobra made with his tail while grunting loudly. "NNNGH! ERRGH! RAAAA! YRRRRRGH!" Between the sheer ferocity of the assault and the vocal diversion, a few slashes got through, cutting Simon's right arm and his left thigh. Another almost went into his skull, but a well-timed duck left only his beret to take the hit. Cobra paused to look at the hat now speared onto his tail, giving Simon the brief opening to run in and kick him to the floor.

As he leapt in to impale him through his coils, the tail struck again, whipping Simon back into one of the columns. Cobra slithered up another, wrapping himself around it and digging into one of his belts for a new weapon. The tail now emerged wielding a gun attachment, and he wasted no time firing on the raccoon. Bullets whizzed past Simon as he scrambled around the column for cover, trying to return fire. For someone who provided thirteen feet of target practice, Cobra proved surprisingly nimble, shifting his coils up and down to avoid the shots. Simon growled as he was again forced behind the column under fire.

 _Well, I know_ this  _will work._ Simon poked out again just long enough to throw a grenade at the base of the opposing column. One explosion later and the structure toppled, bringing a screaming Cobra with it. Simon emerged again to find the snake trapped under the rubble, struggling to pull his other half out. "Stop  _doing_ that! You're breaking the rules of  _war!"_

Before Simon could dishonor him further, Cobra twisted around and bit into one of his belts, releasing a massive smokescreen that quickly engulfed the room. Simon reeled back, firing a few more shots in the direction Cobra had been, but heard them hit nothing but metal. Either he was still managing to avoid his gunfire even when he couldn't see it coming, or…

Cobra lunged from the left, venomous fangs bared. Simon dodged instinctively, glimpsing the poison dripping from them in slow-motion before time resumed and he disappeared into the smoke again. Simon took a deep breath and closed his eyes, concentrating on the sound of movement around him. Cobra proved surprisingly difficult to trace when he wasn't talking, but Simon successfully avoided his second attack anyway, grabbing him by the tail and swinging him over his shoulder into the floor. Dazed, Cobra attempted to turn the move against him by contorting around Simon's body, which the raccoon only just noticed in time, kicking away from the encircling coils before they could bind him. Cobra hurriedly darted back into the smoke just as it started to dissipate, vanishing along with it. Simon stepped back slowly, his senses focused.

" _How's it going?"_ Karen asked, startling him more than he'd like to admit.

"Oh, you know, fighting for my life. Typical Tuesday."

" _Cobra?"_

"Yep. For how annoying he is, I sometimes forget that he's the Scalies' top mercenary for a reason. Any advice?"

It was a few, anxious seconds before she replied. " _From your past encounters, I get the impression that Cobra prefers to keep his opponents off-balance, knowing that his skilled knifework, slippery coils, and deadly venom are enough to shake up anyone's concentration and put them on the defensive. You need to take that advantage away from him. You need to be bold."_

"Bold? That's how I got into this mess in the first place."

" _I'm not telling you to be reckless, but boldness is the only way you'll put him down for good. Be bold, Hot Fuzz!"_

His eyes lit up in comprehension. "Yes...I understand."

As soon as the call cut off, he found Cobra. The snake was leaning against the wall, casually perusing the same issue of  _PlayBoa_ he'd discovered earlier. He looked up, seeing Simon staring at him. "Oh, are you  _finished_ now? I was being  _polite!"_

Simon wasn't bothered, nor did he open fire. Instead, he simply withdrew his knife and charged. " **Is that the best you've got?!"**

Cobra flinched, dropping the dirty mag and backing away as Simon stabbed at where he'd been. "What was  _that?!"_

" **What's the matter?! Come a little closer!"** Simon roared, kicking off the wall to boost himself after Cobra, successfully stabbing the knife into his coils.

" _Aggh!_ I don't  _understand_ it, but your manner of  _speaking_ hurts my  _eyes!_ How I wish I had  _eyelids!_

" **Now to finish this!"** Simon leapt away, his knife covered with snake blood and thirsty for more. He charged back in and lunged for Cobra's neck, seeing his head move just a second too late.

As the clash ended, Simon fell to the floor, groaning in pain. But he was in significantly better shape than Compact Cobra, who had his knife lodged in his throat and was coughing up blood.

This somehow didn't keep him from talking. " _I-Impressive!_ You have finally beaten me,  _Maskovich._ I am  _quickly_ losing blood _,_ and have but moments  _to live,_ but with the last few breaths  _within_ me, I must tell you my  _life story._ I was born in-"

"Shut up." Simon unceremoniously shot him through the skull and silenced him for good.

" _Stealing my lines now, huh?"_ Karen asked dryly. " _Well, whatever, you beat him. Now let's get a move on. That superweapon isn't going to blow_ itself  _up."_

"And we need to save White Fox."

" _Sure, that too."_

Simon tried to stand, but a crippling pain suddenly shot up his left leg, making him collapse again. Examining the cause, he ripped open a part of his pant leg where the pain was strongest, grimacing at the sight of two distinct puncture wounds in his flesh. "Uh oh."

" _What's uh oh?"_

"I think Cobra bit me."

" _...How bad is it?"_

"It appears to be slowly darkening my flesh and sizzling ominously, so I'd say pretty bad." It was amazing what years of war did to your sense of horror.

She tried to hide it, but he could hear Karen's voice hitching. " _If that venom spreads to the rest of your body, you won't see the next sunrise. It needs to be stopped before that happens. You know what you have to do?"_

Simon looked down at his infected leg, then to the knife still protruding from Cobra's neck. "Yes. I'll do what needs to be done."

As the heat of battle faded away, the pain only grew stronger. Unable to stand, Simon crawled across the floor towards his only hope of salvation. He knew that in the pursuit of triumph, a sacrifice was sometimes required, and it was only a matter of time before his turn came to make one. He wouldn't hesitate, for his will to live and fight for his beloved homeland was strong. Too strong for something as petty as primal fear to ever compare. For the sake of mammalkind everywhere, it was a small price to pay.

Fighting down the pain, Simon reached his goal, pulling the knife from Cobra's neck and wiping it down on his shirt as best he could, which he insisted to himself was not stalling. Finally, he steadied his nerves, holding the blade above his left leg. This was not going to be pleasant. "For Zootopia."

" _So did you inject the antivenin yet?"_

Simon froze, still holding the knife. "...What?"

" _The antivenin I packed with your medical supplies in case you got bitten? Don't tell me you forgot about it."_

He quietly slipped the knife back onto his belt. "No...I was just...considering other options."

" _What are you, afraid of needles? You don't_ have  _other options, Hot Fuzz. Not unless you chop your leg off or something."_

"Of course not. That would be silly." He soon found the antivenin packed in with his supplies and, trying to forget the past two minutes, stabbed it into his leg. It stung, but significantly less than his near-alternative. A  _very_ small price to pay. "It's done."

" _Good. You should be okay then. Can you stand?"_

It took a few tries, but Simon managed to get back to his feet. "Yeah. Might need to take it slow for a bit though."

" _Not_ too  _slow. Sooner or later, someone else might actually come into that room. See a way out yet?"_

"That big metal door is open now, for...some reason. I guess I'll go that way." Simon started to limp his way out of there, the feeling in his leg slowly returning. "Actually, I should probably thank you first. You may be bitchy, sarcastic, and condescending, but at least I know you'll always have my back, Major Pain."

" _And I always will,"_ she said softly. " _Be all of those things. I'm your commanding officer, after all. And your genetically-enhanced clone."_

"Excuse me?"

" _Kidding. Now enough sap, kick your leg in the ass and get going!"_

He chuckled. "Yes, ma'am."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because the Metal Gear jokes in Chapter 26 just weren't enough, we went and made a full-blown parody! Like most such parodies (coughNickWildeAceAttorneycough), we look forward to seeing the divide between those who get the jokes and those who are left very very confused.
> 
> Mind Jack is one of the latter, by the way, having never played any of the games. Let's call this revenge for all the pro-wrestling references that went over my head. (Jack: Joke's on you. I got most of those references.)
> 
> It's because of shit like this that Simon currently suffers from PTSD: Parody Too Strong Disorder. Good thing this is only a drabble, and likely not one we'll be continuing despite the open ending unless people really want it. There WILL be other Simon drabbles though. We still need to take his leg, after all, and we already know how it happens. ;)
> 
> Compact Cobra belongs to me. His obvious inspiration very much does not.


	5. The Girl With the Dragged-On Hullabaloo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to a very special edition of Born to Be Drabbles. So special that it gets posted as a double-feature with the last one. So special that it should've been posted around Chapter 20 or so. This one is long overdue, folks, and it's not going to be immediately apparent why.
> 
> So let's move the action away from Zootopia (or Giraffrica) for a bit and take a peek into Bunnyburrow, which we haven't visited since...literally ever. That's what happens when the story stops being about Judy, I suppose.

****

**Drabble 5: The Girl With the Dragged-On Hullabaloo**

_Bunnyburrow_

_Gideon Grey's Real Good Baked Stuff_

_7: 30 AM_

It was another beautiful morning in the suburb of Bunnyburrow. The sun was shining, the crops were blooming, and the population sign continued to tick upward at an impossibly fast rate. Gideon was sure at this point that it had to be a local prank, but he wasn't comfortable enough to ask. He had more important things to do anyway.

Like baking pies! It was barely past dawn and he already had plenty of customers to serve. That's life on a farming community for you. Even as a nocturnal predator, Gideon was more or less forced to become a morning mammal to stay in business. Luckily for him, his bright pink apron and naturally cheerful demeanor helped that immensely.

"Here ya go, ma'am," he said politely, handing off a pumpkin pie to a smiling bunny mom and her bouncing daughter.

"Mighty kind of you, Gideon," she replied, trying to keep the young doe from getting at the treat already as they headed out the door.

His establishment was small and humble, much like himself. A lot of white and pink was involved in the design and there were flowers hanging from every wall, not entirely by his own choice. His sponsors simply thought that a fox-run bakery in Bunnyburrow would get more attention if they could make it look as non-threatening as possible. Ironically, they had little issue with Gideon himself, apparently not aware of his less-than-proud history in the community. They did keep him from putting his face on the advertising though.

The bell above his front door rang and in came another customer, one of his regulars. "Good morning, Mr. McGregor."

"Now, Gideon, I told ya to call me Peter," the old farmer said warmly, tugging on the straps of his overalls. "I'm here for my usual."

"One chocolate-covered cheesecake coming up!" Gideon announced, walking back into the kitchen to grab the pre-baked good and bringing it out to his customer. "Here ya go, Mr. McGregor. Still keeping this under wraps from your wife, I hope."

"She'll take my guilty pleasures over my dead body," he muttered, taking the cake and leaving his payment behind. "Ya know, some folks say that foxes are red because they're made by the devil, but I say that's just the color of angels blushing."

"Aw shucks, don't go and make  _me_ blush," he laughed, waving him out the door. To think, at one time, he had been Gideon Grey: terror of the playground. Now he was Gideon Grey: kind to the elderly and friend to all children. It was amazing how much could change in such a relatively short time. And he owed at least part of that to a kind, heartful girl who had kicked him in the face.

The bell rang again and in walked another customer. But this was not one of his regulars. In fact, he was fairly certain he had never seen this particular mammal before. The sight made him gape in shock before he realized how impolite that was and covered his mouth. It had just been so long since he'd seen another fox.

And what a fox she was. A grey fox to be precise, one in color and not just namesake like himself. Not only that, but her choice of fashion was...unconventional. She wore a tight-fitting black tank top emblazoned with the unusual design of a fox skull sticking its tongue out and winking, however a skull could do either of those things. She had a similar pair of black jeans; both were torn in several places and connected by a studded belt that itself seemed to have a chain wrapped around it. There were arm warmers around her wrists and fishnet stockings around her ankles, each highlighting her black paws and claws painted purple. There was a spiked collar around her neck and he was fairly certain she had put it there on purpose. Her eyes were purple, cold, and shrouded by eyeliner.

To say that she stuck out like a sore thumb would be the understatement of the harvest season.

The vixen strolled over, completely unconcerned with the stares she got from the other patrons still hanging about and looking at his selection. Gideon needed a second to regain composure himself, but quickly put on a polite smile. Just because this newcomer had an odd taste in clothing, he wasn't going to make any judgements. A customer was a customer. "Good morning, ma'am. Welcome to Gideon Grey's Real Good Baked Stuff. How may I help you today?"

"Help me?" the stranger asked. "Or help yourself?"

Gideon stared blankly. It was pretty early and he wasn't fully awake yet, but that didn't  _sound_ like an order for a baked good and he wasn't sure how else to respond. "Help...you?"

"Don't you see it? The injustice our kind receives here?" The other patrons had noticeably left, though Gideon wasn't sure that had to do with her  _species,_ per se. "That customer who was just here is a perfect example."

"Peter McGregor?" Gideon asked, more confused than ever. "Nah, it's no big deal keeping his dietary habits a secret. I myself have a weakness for custard. Ya can probably tell." He let out a good-natured laugh, patting his belly.

The stranger seemed surprised regardless. "What? No, I meant-"

The bell rang once again, and another rabbit entered. He was even chubbier than Gideon, wearing a white wife beater that read, "I hate foxes!" in very large print. This statement was evidenced by him blatantly wearing a canister of  _Fox Away_ fox repellent on his belt and wielding a fox taser in his paw. His other paw held a bottle of some unidentified, but clearly alcoholic, beverage that he took a swing from. "Hey! Is this here that there fox establishment ay keep a-hearin' about? Ay have some choice wawds ta share with those lowlife varmints!"

His drunk, indignant expression vanished as soon as he saw the other fox in here with him, who was currently glaring daggers at the rabbit. He gulped, smiling nervously. "Oh, was I supposed to come in first?"

"Excuse me just a second," the vixen said, approaching the bunny and promptly dragging him out of the bakery by his ears. She soon pulled him out of sight, leaving Gideon alone with his thoughts.

_I didn't leave the oven on, did I? I don't think I did. Heavens to Betsy, I better go check just to be sure._

Gideon turned away and headed into the kitchen. Outside, a bloody bunny ran past the front door, pursued by a furious fox. "Get back here, you useless piece of manure!"

Gideon emerged again a second later.  _Phew, false alarm. Sure am glad I checked though._

The gothic fox reentered soon after, brushing dust from her paws and looking very pleased with herself. "Man, can you  _believe_ that guy? Who would've thought someone like him would just randomly show up like that?" She shot him a smile very similar to the one he just saw on that rabbit. "You see what I mean? Foxes everywhere have to deal with completely spontaneous prejudice like that. It's tragic, really."

"Ma'am, I respect yer opinion as a customer, but you are making me a mite uncomfortable," he replied honestly, weakly gesturing to his shelves of goodies. "So...do ya want a pie or something, or…?"

"You  _should_ be uncomfortable!" she pressed, getting uncomfortably close to his face on top of that. "But I'm here to propose a solution."

His eyes shifted left and right. "Okaaaaaay…"

Emboldened by his reluctant consent, she reached into her jean pocket and pulled out a pamphlet. It depicted another local suburb, one that was a fair distance away, but well-known regardless. For all the wrong reasons. "Foxden: a safe haven for all vulpinekind," she described with all the enthusiasm of a public radio host. "Here, your exceptional culinary talents will truly be appreciated. You'll be given your own townhouse suite, a generous startup fee, and a consumer base who will judge you not by the color of your fur, but by the content of your confectionaries."

It was then that Gideon finally realized she was trying to sell him something. He took the pamphlet just to be polite. "Well, that sounds like a mighty fine offer, ma'am, but I couldn't relocate. Bunnyburrow is my home, and while some folks might take issue with me around here, I've made a lot of friends too."

"Come on, you can't tell me a populace of bunnies could accept you so easily!"

He smiled softly. "I didn't say it was easy, ma'am. It took a lot of time and effort to improve myself and fit in here, but at the end of the day, it was all worth it. I guess ya could call it a redemption of sorts. After all that, there's no way I could leave."

The stranger deflated, evidently not expecting to be shut down so quickly. He couldn't help but feel a little sorry for her. "But...if ya want, I could part with a complimentary pie, since ya went through the trouble of coming here and all."

He could tell that she hadn't given up on convincing him as soon as he said that, the gears visibly turning in her head as she thought it over. She had no real reason to stick around and continue trying to sell him on this unless she had a good excuse, and chowing down on a tasty treat was as good as any. Gideon wouldn't have made it this far if he didn't have  _some_ sense of business savvy. "Besides, for all of yer talk about my baking, have ya actually tried any of it before?"

She tensed up. "O-Of course I've tried it! I I couldn't have enough of your lies-I mean pies! But just as a reminder...what flavors do you have?"

Now that they were on a familiar topic, Gideon finally started to relax. "Well, we've got quite a wide variety, ma'am. There's apricot, lemon, pumpkin, pineapple, blueberry-"

" _NO!"_ she screeched, nearly giving him a heart attack. He had relaxed too soon. "Sorry. I'm...allergic."

"Must be some allergy," he said, shaking it off. "Any preference then?"

Five minutes later, the strange vixen was seated at one of his tables, eating a slice of  _black_ berry pie. He really should've guessed that. "How do ya like it?" he asked, remaining as hospitable and self-conscious as ever.

She shrugged. "It's alright, I guess." But her wagging tail sent a very different message.

Gideon beamed, pleased with the private compliment. Normally, that would be good enough for him, but while he wasn't usually the nosy type, he had to admit he was very curious about this particular customer. "So...Foxden, huh? I take it that's where yer from?"

She swallowed her latest chunk of pie, a bit hurriedly in her haste to answer. "Oh yeah, it's great there. Especially as of late. Our economy has really been booming with all the new business in town. Would be an awesome time to move in, hypothetically speaking."

 _New business? Is that what you're trying to recruit me for?_ "What about you?"

"I run one of the biggest." He meant what her life was like, but he'd take any insight he could get. "It technically belongs to my dad, but he's been off on a business trip for a while, so he left me in charge. Since then, I've been taking matters into my own paws, trying to draw in whatever fresh blood I could find so that Foxden remains the ultimate haven of foxhood." There was a strange dissonance in her voice, like she couldn't decide how she felt about that. "All the cool foxes are moving there, or so I hear."

"That's a noble goal," Gideon said, hoping that he wasn't getting her hopes up too much. "I'm sure yer dad will be proud."

"That would be a first." She winced, gritting her teeth. A clear sign she had let too much slip out and was quickly guarding herself again. "A-Anyway...how about that Foxden? I heard it was rated a 99% perfect place to live, except that there's no bakery around. Weird, huh?"

Gideon was silent.

"Ugh, fine, you  _win_ , okay?!" She stuffed a large piece of the pie into her mouth, talking right through it. "I know I'm bad at this. You don't have to rub it in."

"Um…"

"I don't need this!" She got up abruptly, still talking with her mouth full. "You can keep your bunny-loving bakery to yourself for all I care!"

"Er…"

"I'm heading back to Foxden! Enjoy being stuck out here in the boonies, you...you...fat guy!" She kicked her chair over and stormed out of the bakery.

_What just happened?_

She stormed back in, snatching up the pie she'd left behind. "And I'm taking this too! Just try and stop me!" She stormed back out.

"It was a free pie…"

She stormed back in, slamming a bill onto the table. "10 bucks better be enough! Deal with it!" She stormed back out.

"It was...a free...pie…"

Thoroughly browbeaten as he was, Gideon couldn't accept this payment, especially once he took a closer look at the bill she left behind. "Hey, wait!"

He rushed out the door, running pretty fast for someone of his stature. Ignoring the several greetings he received from the locals, (which he still felt guilty about to this day) he sought out the temperamental goth, catching sight of her just as she was about to round another corner. "Hold on!"

She stopped in her tracks, scowling at him as he finally caught up, panting breathlessly. "What is it? Haven't had enough watching me squirm yet?"

He held up the bill. "You can keep this. And the pie."

"That's all you wanted?" she asked, her anger defusing. "So I forgot it was free. Just consider that a tip then."

"It's a $100 bill."

"Huh?" She looked at it again, realizing that she had missed a zero. "T-That's what I meant, obviously. It's a generous tip."

"With all due respect, ma'am, I'm not sure I've done anything to warrant that."

"What are you, a cop? It's for putting up with me." She sighed, seeking solace from the warm pie in her paws. "I'm sorry for snapping at you. I can be a bit...defensive, when I don't get what I want."

"No hard feelings," Gideon said, smiling. "I wasn't always such a ray of sunshine myself. We all have our demons."

"Some stronger than others," she replied, smiling back ever-so-slightly regardless. "Thanks anyway. That was pretty cool of you. I'd still like to have you in Foxden, but maybe I'll settle for swinging by here every now and then. You do make some damn good pie."

"I've been told," he admitted, blushing.

"See you around, ya big dork," she laughed, waving back as she started to walk away again.

Gideon could've left it there and called it a day, but after everything he'd been through with this girl, he had to know at least one more thing. "What's your name?"

She stopped just long enough to look over her shoulder at him. "Vexey." Then she rounded the corner and disappeared.

And so Gideon was left with a name, a lucrative tip, and a big steaming pile of curiosity. Almost subconsciously, he pulled the pamphlet she had given him out of his pocket and looked down at it, seeing the so-called "ultimate haven of foxhood" staring back at him.

_Vexey, huh? Wonder what her story is. Ah well, I better get back before those kits get into my sweets again._

Gideon hurriedly slipped away, back to his humble bakery.

* * *

_Suburban Outskirts_

_7:55 AM_

Meanwhile, Vexey continued to walk away, occasionally partaking in the world's most expensive pie, until a large vehicle cut into her path. It was an SUV, built for just this kind of all-terrain driving, and painted completely black. "It's about time you got here," Vexey said, climbing into the back seat. The car took off again as soon as she did, making a beeline back to Foxden.

"So how'd it go?" asked the driver, a skinny, black-suited corsac fox in shades. His ears were pointed rigidly up.

Loud sniffing filled the air. "Couldn't be all bad if she brought back pie," said another fox in the seat next to him, completely identical except that his ears were perpetually drooped.

They had names, but Vexey could never bother to remember them, so she always just called them Up and Down.

"Hate to break it to you, but the job was a bust. You can cross that bakery off our list," she said bitterly.

"Yeah, but you still got pie," Down insisted. "You know what they say: every pie has a silver filling."

"You can't have my pie," she said firmly, holding it away.

"That's a shame," Up said. "Not about the pie, about the bakery. But at least you did your best, right?"

Vexey pursed her lips.  _Let's see. I bungled my manipulation, got caught in a lie, freely shared unnecessary information, apologized to my mark, and ended up paying_ him  _a small fortune._ "Yeah. I did my best."

"Good. And hey, there'll be other chances. Don't need to fret just because your mighty criminal empire is somewhat lacking in baked goods."

"Except that it's not  _my_ empire, is it?" she asked pointedly. "I'm just borrowing it for a while."

"Well, then maybe that should change," Down suggested.

"...What do you mean by that?"

It was Up who answered. "If you really want to prove how worthy you are of ruling an empire, then maybe you should start by claiming it for yourself. How can you expect to get anywhere by living in your father's shadow, Lady Reynard?"

Vexey leaned back in her seat, pondering this. "That's a rather treasonous idea you two have given me. Care to explain why?"

Down shrugged. "Hey, you're not the only one sick of living under the Count's rule. He acts all friendly and jokey, but you can tell he's looking down his pointy nose at everyone. At least with you, we can sort of relate to being underappreciated."

"Besides, by his own philosophy, anyone who can outfox the Count is more worthy of being in charge anyway," Up added. "He couldn't even complain."

Vexey stroked her chin, getting more and more invested in this train of thought. "Yeah...I could finally show the old mammal who's boss.  _Literally!_ And not just him, but his precious  _Nicholas_ too. The golden boy so special that Daddy ditched me in a heartbeat as soon as he found out he went cop. I've never even met the guy and I'd gladly put a bullet through his head. Then we'll see who isn't  _fox enough!"_

Vexey looked down at her pie again, then passed it to the front. "I change my mind. You deserve a reward for giving me such brilliant inspiration. Continue serving me instead of my father and you'll get even better treatment. How does 'Royal Attendants to the Queen of all Foxes', sound?"

"Sounds delicious!" Down said, currently buried up to his muzzle in pie.

"What exactly does the 'Royal Attendant' position entail?" Up asked curiously.

"You know, giving me advice, enforcing my will, rubbing my feet, that sort of thing."

"Eh, works for me."

"Me too!" Down agreed, licking his lips.

Up glared at him through his shades. "Did you eat that entire pie?"

"Don't worry, I'll buy you another," Vexey reassured him. "In fact, as my first royal decree,  _everyone_ gets pie!"

"Yeah!" Down cheered. "Long live the queen!"

"Long live the queen!" Up joined in.

"Long live the queen!" Vexey finished, smiling contently. Thoughts of glorious conquest began to take over before they even made it back to Foxden.

 _Oh yes, I could get_ used  _to this._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So begins the central, overarching plot of Born to Be Drabbles. Yes, there is a central, overarching plot of Born to Be Drabbles.
> 
> Meet Vexey, Reynard's daughter and Nick's little sister. If that feels like an out-of-nowhere twist to you, then here's a bigger surprise: Reynard has hinted at her existence no less than three times in the main fic thus far. (There's a reason we wanted to start this around Chapter 20.) Like the rest of Nick's relatives, she is named after another Disney fox. In this case, Vixey from The Fox and the Hound. Vexey, Up, and Down all belong to me.
> 
> But like all things Drabbles, this will not be required reading for the main story in the interest of not confusing the (disturbingly many) readers who have yet to venture over here. Vexey will be our little secret for now, with the events of her arc gradually unfolding every few drabbles or so. As such, you'll also be seeing more frequent drabbles from this point forward, at least one with every new chapter. Probably.
> 
> So say goodbye to Vexey for now, but we'll be seeing plenty more of her to come. ;)


	6. Lucy at the Bat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a Lucy-themed drabble! Yeah, I'm sure that was hard to predict, what with her major reappearance in the main story and the debut of her origin story by Mind Jack. But there isn't going to be any overlap as this drabble covers a separate period of time only shortly before BtBW.
> 
> Even better, you get to see professional thief Lucy Sang actually pulling a heist for once! Hold on to your seats, and your valuables!

**Drabble 6: Lucy at the Bat**

_Savannah Central_

_Sunrise High-Rise - The Crimson Suite_

_9: 46 PM_

"Now  _this_ is the life."

Most bats may have been content to spend their days sleeping from hanging branches or bars, but for Lucy Sang, there was nothing better than a soft, comfortable, and comically oversized bed. Her instincts didn't like that, but she never was one for convention. That was why she lived up here on the surface instead of the dreary Nocturnal District like most of her kind. Maybe it was just what she was used to, but the inherent freedom of the surface world carried with it an undeniable appeal.

Aside from the bed, her current penthouse suite also featured such debaucheries as velvety red carpeting, a bathtub with high-powered jets and an entire shelf of scented soaps, a miniature self-playing piano, and cushioned bars on the ceiling just in case she  _did_ feel like hanging upside-down. It was truly the lap of luxury, and not at all the kind of place that the police would be looking for her.

Yes, that was another reason she preferred to stay up here. Being a professional thief could be a risky job, even without taking into account her many hobbies on the side. Sadly, most of the city was only familiar with one or two of those hobbies, and they didn't tend to be appreciative of them. Luckily, the ZPD everywhere seemed to be under the impression that she was nothing more than some petty criminal hiding out in a back alley somewhere. Insulting, but it helped keep them off her back. How like land mammals to never bother looking up.

They would be in for quite a shock when they did though. Lucy dipped a black brush into a bowl of paint, swirling it around a bit to get a good swab of it. She couldn't fit an easel with her luggage, and the hotel staff explicitly said she couldn't paint on the walls, so she sought to improvise. Holding the brush tightly in a prehensile foot, she flew back up to the ceiling to apply it to the surface of her work. It was so nearly finished now. Just a few more rounds and…

"Done!" Lucy announced cheerfully, flying back down and flopping onto the bed to look up at her latest masterpiece. Spread across the entire ceiling of the room was a series of black shapes, stretching up from one end to the other at varying heights. One of them right in the center depicted the very building she was currently staying in, with many more surrounding it, creating a fairly-accurate skyline of Zootopia. Lucy smiled up at a job well done. This was so good, the hotel might actually appreciate her improvement to their bland aesthetics.

Well, they might if she hadn't added the extra touch of depicting the entire city on fire. But she was an artist, and she refused to quiet her artistic vision just because some critics wouldn't approve. She had a statement to make and boy had she made it.

"It is quite an exquisite piece, Mistress Sang," a smooth voice said. A mongoose in butler garb approached the foot of her bed. There was a large monocle over his left eye and he held in his paw a silver platter. A fitting reward for her efforts.

"Thank you, Monty. Now what have you got for me today?" Lucy asked, eyeing the platter curiously.

"Refreshment and a potential heist, Mistress Sang. In my humble opinion, I believe you will find this one particularly intriguing." He lifted the platter and held out the contents to her.

"Is that so?" she asked, grabbing her drink and sipping at it absentmindedly as she looked down at the newspaper article that had been circled for her. Monty Gosland was only a temp, but he had been pretty good at picking out jobs she would find sufficiently challenging, and this appeared to be no exception.

_Priceless Blood Diamond Purchased by Collector in Foxden!_

It came with a picture too, of not just the diamond itself, which looked as big and sparkly as expected, but of this suspiciously-unnamed collector's old manor in Foxden. She had never been to the distant suburb before, but even from just the blurry photo provided, this place looked pretty state-of-the-art. "This could be a fun challenge indeed. And if it's for something with 'blood' in its name, I feel kinda obligated anyway." Finishing up her drink, she chucked the bound and gagged rat into the nearby trashcan and picked up the paper, continuing to read over the article as she paced around on the bed.

"Would you like me to prepare your vehicle for the ride out to Foxden, Mistress Sang?" Monty asked.

"My wings  _could_ use a bit of a rest," she said, stretching them out a little. "But as soon as we get close, I'll fly from there. It's an unfamiliar neighborhood and I need to remain inconspicuous."

"As you wish."

Reaching the end of the article, Lucy was left more curious than ever. Whoever wrote it was a total slacker because she had barely gleaned anything at all. All she really knew was the location.

But that was all she needed.

* * *

_Foxden_

_The Mild Manor_

_11: 21 PM_

The drive to Foxden was long and arduous, but it passed by quickly when there was so little traffic out here in the sticks. Not that most cars would ever come near her ride anyway. It was essentially a civilian-sized Humvee, a civilian around the size of your average rhinoceros, but with controls that allowed it to be driven by a rodent. There was a surprisingly niche market for such vehicles among smaller mammals, despite the rush of power it gave Lucy every time she drove it. She reflected on this as she ran over a sign on the side of the road, grinding it into the dirt.

This was, however, also why she didn't like to bring it to heists. Not wanting to be spotted too close to her target, she drove off the side of the dirt road and put it in park. She gathered the tools she would need for the heist into a small pack, small enough to carry without too much difficulty, then flew out through the sunroof, making sure to arm her security system first. If anyone touched it, the car would emit a sonic pulse powerful enough to scramble their brains and expel enough blood from their orifices to make it worth the trouble.

With her vehicle secured, Lucy flew the rest of the way towards her destination, staying low enough to survey the surroundings, but high enough that she wouldn't be easily spotted. For this purpose, she was equipped with a pair of binoculars that she held up to her eyes with her feet, getting a good glimpse at the suburb of Foxden from a safe distance above.

What she could see was unsettling even to her. Foxden was like what someone who didn't know any better would call a perfect community. There were rows after rows of houses, all completely identical and without so much as a blade of grass out of place. As expected from the name, the only civilians she could see were foxes, all going about their business with bright, cheerful smiles on their faces. Mowing their lawns, taking out the trash, saying "howdy do!"s to their neighbors. They did it all like clockwork.  _No one should be this happy. Ever._

Judging by this level of activity, it appeared that Foxden actually ran on a nocturnal schedule, unlike most of Zootopia. Refreshing as that was, it could make things harder for her now that most of her natural advantages of stealing at night were lost. Most of the town was active, and they all had night vision. Deciding that the added challenge would only makes things more interesting, Lucy refocused on the job at hand, searching around with her binoculars for the manor from the paper.

On the bright side, all of these copy-pasted houses made the one that was actually unique stick out all the more. The manor appeared to be smack dab in the center of Foxden, to the point that every other row of houses branched out from it like the spokes of a giant wheel.  _A collector, huh? This guy's "collected" the entire community! Not bad, hee hee hee._

As she finally started to close in on her target, Lucy descended, not wanting to be caught flying too close. Looking for an opening in the bustle of activity, Lucy settled for a birthday party, landing on the roof of a nearby house just as its fox residents brought in a fox clown to sing a fox song while a bunch of fox kits ate fox cake. She hoped it was actually made of foxes.  _Ugh, I hate monospecies societies. So boring!_

From there, the approach was much easier. Lucy was practiced enough at leaping from roof to roof that she didn't even need to use her wings, and she was small enough that she was sure no one would spot her.

That all changed once she was one hop away from the manor. The picture from the paper hadn't quite done it justice how much security she would have to deal with. The manor itself was of an old-fashioned design and stood three stories tall, surrounded by a big stone wall on each side. That normally wouldn't pose any problem for her except that there were watchtowers on every corner and the distinct glint of cameras pointed up towards the sky. Motion detectors most likely. Flying in would be far too risky, and the ground wasn't looking much better. The only way in she could see was an iron gate right in front, which of course was heavily guarded.

 _Typical Monday. Alright, let's figure this out._ Making sure she was out of sight for a while, Lucy opened her pack and pulled out a pencil and sketchbook. She spent the next several minutes observing the manor closely, idly drawing out a map of the building and its defenses. Guard patrols, cameras, everything she could see from her perch. Once she was satisfied, she stared at the finished drawing for a long while, her calculating mind slowly forming a plan of attack.

Finally, she returned her supplies to her pack and carefully climbed down from the house using a drainpipe. She then skittered on all fours to the nearest parked car, a black SUV, and hid herself underneath. After watching the guards at the gate for a while, she had noticed a potential weak point, one that she could use to secure a way inside.

That weak point was their apparent supervisor who kept coming out to check on them. "See anything yet?" asked a gothic fox who didn't seem to have any idea what she was doing. She had a purse casually slung over her shoulder, as if she were just coming back from a night of clubbing and not guarding valuable property.

"Nothing, Lady Reynard," answered one of the gate guards, a corsac fox in a black suit, shades, and pointed ears.

"Except for how often you keep asking that," said a similar guard next to him. "You expecting a package from EBray or something?"

"Or something," she answered. "Father is concerned about that new diamond of his. Apparently, it's very special, ambiguously supernatural even. And before he can figure out what to do with it, he needs us to be on guard so that some shifty lowlife doesn't swipe it. Which kinda sucks when we live in an entire community of them." She started looking around as if expecting to suddenly spot an intruder.

Lucy sneered.  _Good luck, lady._ She didn't need supernatural, but value was value. This diamond sounded like quite the prize, and now she knew just how to get it. Scanning the ground under the vehicle, Lucy quickly spotted a good-sized rock and chucked it as hard as she could at the far side of the wall.

"What was that?!" the grey fox yelled, whirling towards the sound. "Up, Down, go investigate that suspicious noise!"

The corsac fox pair looked at each other uncertainty. "Actually, that sounded a lot like a thrown rock, which probably means that someone's trying to distract us," Down stated.

Up nodded in agreement. "In cases like this, your father advises looking for where the noise  _came from_ rather than-"

"I don't care what Father says!" she screeched. "I'm in charge right now and I said investigate!"

"Yes, ma'am!" They both rushed away from their posts immediately.

Lucy crawled out of her hiding place as the vixen sighed, rubbing her temples. "I don't need this tonight. It's bad enough the old bastard is leaving me here, the last thing I need is a lack of vigilance." Vexey turned and headed back through the iron gate, adjusting her purse over her shoulder. Even that felt heavier now.

 _I'm trying to rob the place and even_ I'm  _not carrying this much crap around!_ Lucy tried to keep as still as she could, which was easy when she barely had room to move in the first place. The combined smell of eyeliner, claw polish, and foot lotion was making her queasy, and there was a big metal sphere of some kind that kept trying to roll over her. She was almost tempted to pocket her cell phone, but she had more important things to steal.

Lucy peeped cautiously through the opening in the purse, giving her a limited view of the garden outside of the manor. The cobblestone path Vexey carried her across was lined by hedges on each side, sprouting with black, orange, and green flowers. It was practically a given that there would be a giant sculpted hedge smack dab in the center of it all, depicting what appeared to be a suited fox holding up a cane and grinning at his obvious success. It almost made Lucy retch had she the room to.

Vexey seemed to have a similar opinion as she stopped and glared up at it. "What are  _you_ looking at?" She made to keep moving, but stopped again, standing in place for a moment and then sitting down in front of the hedge, sighing. She didn't look like she was about to budge again anytime soon.

 _No, don't stop here! I don't care about your Daddy issues, lady! Keep moving!_ But she didn't. In fact...

 _Is she_ crying  _now? Okay, I'm officially done here._ Lucy chanced another look around. It was too much to hope for that there would be less security inside the perimeter. There were tons of guards out here, though unlike the rest of the town, not all of them were foxes. She could see a tiger, a rhino, and several other species lurking around out here, linked together only by their shared sense of fashion.

It was a fox that came over first though. He looked much like the two before, but his ears were pointed out to the side, as if his head was making preparations to fly off. "Are you alright, Lady Reynard?"

"I'm  _fine_ , Sideways," she snapped, sniffling a little. "Just trying to keep things together."

"You mean the security, or…?"

She glowered at him. "Get back to work."

Sideways nodded reluctantly and moved away, not noticing the passenger riding on his back. Lucy knew this was a much riskier hiding place, but she couldn't take the drama anymore. Sideways wasn't taking her into the building either though, returning to a typical patrol path with the other guards. That wasn't good; all it would take was one of them to look too long at his back and realize that there wasn't supposed to be a bat there. She needed to get him inside  _now._

Lucy slowly climbed up his back, moving with the kind of stealth that let her ancestors creep up on cattle without alerting them, then bit into his neck.

"Yow!" Sideways instinctively slapped a paw over the wound, but Lucy was already back in her original position, licking the blood from her fangs. "I swear, these mosquitoes are getting bigger every year," the fox muttered, looking distastefully at his wet paw. "Why does my blood have to be so delicious?"

 _Don't flatter yourself. I wouldn't serve this at a strip club._ Lucy continued to hold on as Sideways, foregoing his patrol for now, instead headed inside the manor through a pair of fancy doors, bringing her one step closer to her target.

The fox was moving at a quickened pace, so she didn't get much of a look, but what she did see was impressive. It reminded her a bit of the Crimson Suite with all of its red carpeting, extending up the side of a pair of ornate staircases that curved up to the second floor, all guarded of course. A very expensive-looking chandelier hung overhead and Lucy's first thought was what it would be like to drop it on someone. Too noisy to find out sadly. On the wall ahead, between the staircases, was a giant portrait of the same fox the hedge was modeled after. He was sitting on a throne-like chair in front of a black background, one leg crossed over the other, while holding a cane between his paws and smirking devilishly at whoever was painting him. As an artist herself, Lucy had to admit it was a well-made piece, albeit highly narcissistic. What was really impressive was finding someone more full of themselves than her.

She didn't get to examine any of these interesting sights further because her escort made a sharp turn to the right and headed into the nearby bathroom to clean up. It was pretty nice, like something you'd find at a resort, and it wasn't like she'd never been in a male bathroom before. Sideways walked up to the sink and turned the faucet, looking into the wide mirror as he cleaned out the wound on his neck. Lucy climbed slowly down his backside, planning to hop off here and go on her way once he left.

But like all plans that were thought aloud, this one didn't work out like that. Sideways turned around just a little too early to look at the back of his neck, instead catching Lucy hanging out around his tail. It spiked up in alarm.

The fox let out a girly scream and tried to swipe at her, but she had already leapt off, landing atop the sink's faucet. She pulled the pivot rod, plugging the drain of the still-running faucet, then flew around behind Sideways as he grabbed for her again. She landed a flying kick to the back of his head and smashed his shades into the mirror. "That's what you get for wearing sunglasses at night!"

As he pulled himself back up, Lucy came down on top of his head, forcing it into the now partially-filled sink. While he thrashed around in the water, Lucy eyed a toaster plugged into the nearby wall outlet.  _That'll do._ She casually tossed it into the sink with him.

Sideways screamed, a sound mostly muffled by water and the violent convulsions of his own body, then went still. Lucy turned the water off as a courtesy to the other residents, then dragged his limp body, with a good amount of effort, into a bathroom stall, locking it from the inside. With any luck, they'd think he was just really backed up.

A voice suddenly crackled over the intercom. Lucy recognized it as the mopey vixen from outside. " _Attention, everyone. We have reason to believe there is an intruder in our midst. Stay on high alert and don't do anything I would do. I mean, don't do anything stupid! I-I mean-!"_

Lucy heard a rush of footsteps flooding into the manor from outside. She had no idea how they were on to her already, but she wasn't going to be sneaking past that many guards anytime soon. She looked around the bathroom until she spotted something: an air vent, the best friend of thieves everywhere! Unless you were dumb enough to get lost in them. Lucy flew up to the grating, and with less strength than it took to drag a dead fox around, managed to pull it off, climbing inside.

Normally, she might be a little concerned about the fact that she didn't actually know where her quarry was hidden. But thanks to all the ego that radiated from this place, it was a fair assumption that it would be hidden directly inside this so-called collector's office, probably in a big fancy safe, and on the top floor of the manor. All she had to do was keep going up until she got somewhere that looked important enough.

" _Oh, and activate the Ventilation Defense System. You know how these things go."_

Seconds later, she heard a fan click on. "Wow, that's actually pretty clever," was all Lucy had time to say before she was sucked up and pulled back through the vent, straight towards a scary rotating fan. Panicking, Lucy flapped like mad to keep herself from being pulled in, but was slowly losing ground...air, whatever.

It was only through a stroke of luck that she didn't wind up a vampire purée. As she was sucked backwards, Lucy spotted another grating coming up on her right. She'd only have one shot at this. The bat arched sharply to the left, and then threw herself back to the right, slamming herself against the grate hard enough to bust herself through it.

Lucy emerged in another hallway, not having enough time to regain her bearings and fly before she hit the ground, lying atop the broken grate. "Ow…" Her small body could take a lot of punishment, but she was still sore all over. Better than just being  _all over._

" _I think I heard something on the second floor! Activate the Obligatory Laser Array!"_

Lucy had to hand it to them; they really pulled out all the stops to make this feel like a real jewel heist. She took a sharp breath and left the ground again as a grid of red, crisscrossing lasers activated in front of her, so close together than a mammal any larger than her would have found traversing them near-impossible. But Lucy was in her element now. The bat swerved back and forth between the lasers as if they were little more than swimming practice. One of her backstrokes put the edge of her pack a little too close and she heard it sizzle and smoke behind her.  _Ah, so they're the burny kind of lasers. The fun ones!_

Keeping a tight hold of her pack to make sure none of her supplies fell out, Lucy did one last pirouette and made a ten-point landing on the other side, blowing a kiss to an invisible audience.

"Hey, up here! I heard something sexy!" A veritable stampede of footsteps starting storming towards her location.

 _Guano._ With little other option, Lucy darted to the nearest window and pried it open, stepping outside again.

She was on the side of the manor, inside the scope of where the motion sensors might catch her, but she stuck to the walls as close as possible regardless. Not wanting to risk flying, and because she just wanted an excuse to use it, Lucy pulled a grappling hook from her pack and flung it onto the lip of the roof above, the top floor. Hearing the sounds of guards scurrying about the hallway she just left, Lucy climbed swiftly upwards, pulling the rope up with her just as someone got smart enough to look out the window. "Damn it, Theo! I  _told you_ nothing sexy ever happens around here!"

On the top floor of the building, Lucy found a large window that looked down into an office below. Staring back up at her was a carpet in the shape of the owner's face, smiling in mirth at its own surroundings. Everything else was thankfully less narcissistic, but still wildly unpredictable. There was a stack of cards on one small table in the corner, with a few of them tacked onto a dartboard above. On the opposite wall was a fish tank, its occupants somehow altered to possess creepy grins, with a sticky note labeled "Patent?" stuck to the surface. A fox-headed cane was leaning against the surface of a desk cluttered with similar oddities, including a folder labeled "HB."

She'd almost be curious enough to check it out, but she could also spy a safe, just like she expected, taking up most of the wall behind it. Lucy rubbed her clawed hands together and giggled in glee. She was so close now, she could practically taste the blood in that blood diamond, even if it  _was_ just a name.

She didn't even bother using any of her tools for this, finding her own sharp claws sufficient enough to cut a hole in the surface of the window and pry it out. She wasn't particularly worried about security this high up, figuring that the owner likely thought his own quarters untouchable. She touched down right on top of the carpet's snout, pausing for a second to see if gatling guns popped out of the walls or something. Nothing happened. "Too easy."

A nearby dresser burst open and Vexey sprung out, followed by Up and Down. "Ha! I  _told_ you she was after the blood diamond!"

"I don't think anyone was doubting that…" Down muttered.

"So the diamond  _is_ up here?" Lucy asked, grinning.

"Yes!" Vexey's face fell. "Shit!"

"Lady Reynard, shall we dispose of this intruder?" Up asked, pushing up the rim of his sunglasses with a claw.

"It's either that or tell Father so  _he_ can take all the credit." They both looked at her. "Meaning yes!"

Lucy was pretty confident she could take them, even with the significant size difference, up until they each whipped out an honest-to-goodness katana, holding the blades in easily guessable directions. The two bodyguards were calm, collected, and perfectly in control of the situation.

So Lucy took that control away. "Hey, by any chance, are you two related to that guy I killed in the bathroom?"

They froze, eyes widening behind their shades. "Stylianmichalocolos? He's...dead?" Up asked weakly.

Lucy smirked cruelly. "Despite what they say, not all toasters  _toast toast."_

Up and Down snarled and rushed at her from opposite sides. Down struck first, swinging at the spot Lucy was standing a split-second after she darted out of it, leaving a scar on the cheek of the carpet. Up moved in immediately after and attempted to cut off her escape with an overhead swing. Lucy quickly dropped altitude, but her pack didn't make it this time, tossed aside as the straps were severed.

The brothers relentlessly kept up the assault, and it was the laser grid all over again trying to swoop, dive, and twist around their swings. Lucy hoped one of them would hit the other at some point, but they had clearly practiced together often and were confident that wouldn't happen, even with their blades coming within inches of each other. Attempting to force the issue, Lucy managed to grab onto the blunt edge of one weapon as it swung past, being carried along until it came to an abrupt stop. The other brother, and she couldn't even bother to keep track of which was which right now, acted fast and swung his katana at her prone position.

Lucy let go and dropped to the floor, letting one sword strike the other and making a satisfying clang. Having bought herself a second or two where they weren't swinging at her, Lucy made a dive for her pack on the ground, pulling out the first tool she could find. As Up turned to face her again, a grappling hook wrapped around his neck and pulled Up down to the ground, clocking his head against the floor and knocking him out. Lucy hopped on top of him, and as Down hesitated to attack for fear of harming him, Lucy threw her whole pack into his face, then landed a flying kick to his chin, launching Down up into the air before he landed hard back on the floor. As he started to get back up, Lucy slammed the pack onto his head again and this time Down stayed down.

Feeling pretty good about all of that, Lucy looked back over at Vexey, whose mouth was hanging open in shock. Evidently, she wasn't expecting an eight-inch bat to take out two trained bodyguards with katanas.

She snapped out of it quickly, or maybe she just wasn't savvy enough to see where this was going. "You think you're hot guano do you? Well, let's see how you deal with  _this!"_ She reached into her purse, the same one Lucy had used as a makeshift taxi, and pulled out…

"What is it?" Lucy asked. It was the same black sphere that kept bumping into her before, but that didn't really answer her question.

" _It_ is the bringer of your demise!" Still not exactly an answer. Vexey began to toss the ball up and down in her paw, looking unnervingly smug. "Father always said I should make my own weapon, but how could I ever compete with his all-in-one deal? So I had to get a little creative, and I must say, I really outdid myself. Now you'll see  _exactly_ what I'm capable of!"

Indeed she did, for Vexey tossed the ball a little too high and it came down on her head. The goth let out an indignant choking noise and crumpled to the floor.

Lucy needed a second to register that the fight was over before it even started. Not the most graceful of victories, but she rarely questioned good fortune when it smiled upon her. Or bad fortune when it struck down her enemies in hilarious fashion.

In any case, the safe was now unguarded and she wasn't opening it yet. That was the real problem. Lucy was quick to remedy that as she flew up to the steel door and latched onto the lock. She needed no fancy stethoscope, for her big ears did the job just fine. Lucy pressed one against the safe and used her claws to turn the lock, occasionally opening her mouth to let her echolocation pinpoint it even better. It was a pretty hefty combination despite the old-school design, but she soon had it cracked regardless. Lucy flew back as the safe door opened in front of her, already smiling preemptively at the sight of the forthcoming blood diamond.

She didn't see it. At least, not initially. Lucy wasn't sure what to expect from this madmammal's safe, but at the very least, she was expecting treasure, not a truly massive blueberry cake and nothing else. Lucy was trying to decide if she could have the cake and eat it too when she spotted something on top of it. Yes, it may not have been the ideal kind of display, but the blood diamond was sitting right there on top!

 _Fine, he can keep the cake, but I'm licking all of the icing off of that diamond. Slooooooowly._ Lucy took off towards the impromptu decoration, reaching for it hungrily.

Then the entire cake exploded beneath her. "SURPRISE!"

Lucy shrieked, spiraling backwards and almost hitting the floor again. She righted herself just as confetti started to fall, a triumphant fanfare playing over speakers within the safe itself. Beneath all of that, she could see a figure dancing inside of the ruined cake. It was hard to tell because of the icing covering him, but she was pretty sure this was the same whackjob who bought the diamond and owned this surreal property. "Congratulations!" the old fox cheered. "You did it!"

Lucy narrowed her eyes. "Am I being  _Steer'd?_ You better get Axton Butcher out here before I frost that cake with your blood."

He stopped dancing, rolling his spectacled eyes as if she was just being a killjoy. "Relax, will ya? The diamond is real. In fact, consider it a down payment on what I have to offer you."

He tossed the icing-coated diamond to Lucy, who caught it in her feet, looking down at the shiny bauble and checking to make sure it was the real deal. It was. "Alright…you have my attention. Now what the heck was this all about?" She was honestly tempted to fly right out of here now that she got what she wanted, but she was far too curious for that. It was all about the journey, not the destination, though she would be more than happy to burn this place to the ground if the destination didn't satisfy.

The fox stepped out of what remained of his cake, kicking some of it off of his pant legs. "First off, allow me to introduce myself."

"No."

He ignored her. "I am Count Reynard, the master of this fine estate. And  _you_ are Lucele Sang, correct?" He smiled, noticed the frosting stuck to his teeth, licked them clean, then smiled again.

"It's Lucy."

"I know." He walked past her, out into the main room of the office. If he paid any mind to the three unconscious foxes on the ground, one of whom was his daughter, he didn't show it. "I also knew you wouldn't be able to resist the allure of my blood diamond. It was all a test, you see, to prove if you were truly as talented as the rumors say. And I'm happy to say that you passed with flying colors: black, grey, and green!"

"Yay me," she said dryly. "Though I will admit this was the most creative way anyone has ever hired me. It was actually kinda fun."

"I'm glad you think so, because the job I have in mind is going to be  _significantly_ larger." He leaned onto the side of his desk, then recoiled when he realized the mess he was making. "Even larger than my cleaning bill."

"Well, I do like large things. In general." Lucy leaned in closer. "So what do you want me to steal? And more importantly, what's in it for me?"

"I have a certain...ambition," Reynard explained, trying to keep as still as he could. It was making him visibly uncomfortable. "How do you feel about the crime lords of Zootopia?"

She shrugged. "They're a decent source of income, but kinda full of themselves. Wait, are you a crime lord?"

"Guilty as charged. And  _I_ aim to be the greatest crime lord of them all, by taking all that they have for myself. You  _could_ say it's the biggest heist Zootopia has ever seen."

"Sure, except I'm not the one stealing it," Lucy argued. "That kind of power isn't really my thing anyway. It's too...organized."

"Ah, but that's where your own talents come in. You could get in close, infiltrate their strongholds, and spread your chaos around while I swoop in and pick up the scraps."

She scoffed. "What do  _you_ know about chaos?"

Reynard grabbed the cane leaning against his desk and pointed it at the floor. With a click of its ear, he lit a portion of the carpet on fire, then put it out with what appeared to be chocolate milk. "Okay...point made." Lucy wasn't even sure what exactly she just witnessed. "But really, this is a big step above what I'm used to. I'm just a jewel thief."

It was a bold-faced lie and Reynard didn't buy it for a second. "Oh, you are  _much more_ than a simple jewel thief, Lucy Sang. You're an artist, a killer, an  _entertainer."_ He wasn't even looking at her, casually wiping his cane off with a handkerchief.

For the first time since their conversation began, Lucy was genuinely unnerved. "You...you even know about…?"

"The Belfry? Yes. I won't judge what you do in your free time. In fact, I'll even make it part of your payment. Agree to a long-term partnership with me and you will be given 10% of the financial profits  _plus_ plenty of fresh blood for your personal amusement."

Lucy had to think about that for a moment. True, this was far above her usual MO, but it did have a certain scale to it that she generally lacked. And honestly, she was sick of just grabbing Joe Schmoes off the street. Most of them didn't even survive one challenge. "Make it 30% and you have a deal."

He chuckled. "15."

"25."

"20."

"Deal!"

"Excellent." Reynard didn't appear bothered at all by the haggling. If anything, he probably would've been disappointed if she hadn't. "Care to shake on it?" He licked one of his fingers clean of cake and held it out to her.

A little grossed out, Lucy flew up and shook it regardless. "...You should probably know I killed one of your guys on the way up here."

"Really? How?"

"The toaster in the bathroom."

He started laughing. "The Litmus Toast! I installed that thing just waiting to see if anyone would be dumb enough to kill themselves with it, but I didn't think it would actually happen! That's great!"

Truly, this was a mammal she could relate to.

"Dad, what the hell!"

They looked over mid-shake to see that Vexey was back on her feet, and very,  _very_ pissed off. "You're telling me this whole thing was just a  _farce?!_ "

"I just wanted to make sure everyone in my organization deserved to be here. At least I didn't install one in the ladies' room."

"I'm not talking about the damn toaster!" she snapped. "I meant this entire robbery!"

"Oooooooh, yeah, it was. What about it?" 

"You could've  _told_  me!" she hissed, glaring more at him than Lucy. The bat slowly let go and landed back on the ground, content to just watch this play itself out.

"It needed to feel authentic! The test would've been compromised if she figured it out too early!"

"What, so you think that I would've just blurted it out randomly?!"

"Well...your subtlety could use some work, sweetie."

"I don't need to hear about subtlety from someone covered head to toe in cake!"

"It was all part of the plan! Surely, you must've wondered what the giant cake was  _for?"_

"I thought it was for my  _birthday,_  you pompous asshole!" She was on the verge of tears again.

Reynard stiffened. "Was...that today?"

"It was  _yesterday!_  I thought you were trying to make it up to me!"

"Oh. Well, uh…" He looked back inside the vault, at the exploded cake staining the walls and floor. "I don't need it anymore...so you can have it, if you want."

"I don't even  _like_ blueberry!"

He pursed his lips. "How do you not like blueberry? What is wrong with you?"

"Oh my god, you are the shittiest father! I hope your dear 'Nicholas' thinks so too!"

"Young lady, you are getting  _way_ out of line! I…" He looked down, as if suddenly remembering he still had a guest. "This could go on for a while. You should probably just head out. Don't call me, I'll call you."

"Sure," Lucy said, trying to hide how disappointed she was. She was just thinking she could use some popcorn.

Reynard and Vexey headed out of the room, stepping on top of the still-unconscious Up and Down in the process, with their argument trailing out behind them.

"Look, it's not like it was even a  _real_ birthday! Even  _you_ don't know when that was!"

"You just  _had_ to bring that up again, didn't you?!"

"I'm just saying, you didn't get this attitude problem from me! Hopefully, you'll be through your goth phase by the time I get back!"

"It's not a  _phase_ , Dad! You just don't understand me!"

Despite Reynard's suggestion, Lucy hung around for some time, until even her ears couldn't hear them anymore. Seeing Up and Down finally start to get their act together again, that was when she decided to leave, flying back up through the window she came in from.

Tonight had been even better than expected. Not only did she have a shiny new trophy to add to her collection, now the prospect of many more riches had been placed in her lap, both material and immaterial. And she couldn't wait to sink her teeth into all of them. All it took was a little deal with the devil.

She couldn't help but wonder which of them was the devil.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Lucy was expected, but I bet you didn't think you'd be seeing Vexey again so soon. Technically this isn't a part of the Vexey arc, so what we said before still stands, but it did give us the opportunity to explore Foxden and the Mild Manor, Reynard's old hideout, a little bit. Needless to say, this was only a sneak peek at what's to come and there are still more secrets to be uncovered in the future.
> 
> Not the near future of Drabble 7 though, which is coming soon. Sooner than you think because it's actually like 90% written already. We'll explain why when the time comes.
> 
> Sideways belongs to me. Don't make toast in the bathroom, kids. This has been a public service announcement.


	7. Mrs. Hyenandez, Tear Down This Walrus!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To complement the Lucy drabble, here's another Carla drabble, very different from her last one. This one explicitly takes place during the main story itself, specifically the one week time skip between the Thornbrush and Lang arcs. Wherein we explore a less festive side of our humor-challenged hyena. Also featuring a special guest!
> 
> Now, this drabble is a bit of an experiment. Technically speaking, I only wrote about half of it. The other half was written not by Mind Jack, but by Upplet, as most of the text comes from a friendly RP between the two of us, exploring what would happen if our two most testosterone-fueled mammals should ever cross paths. After a bit of tweaking here and there, we managed to turn it into a drabble. If this style works out, you may be seeing more RP drabbles in the future, so regardless of any zoosona you may have now, consider yourselves honorary guinea pigs!

****

**Drabble 7: Mrs. Hyenandez, Tear Down This Walrus!**

_The Docks_

_8: 53 AM_

_A day off really isn't what it used to be._

Carla sighed as she kicked a stray can out of her way. As a cop, it was probably her duty to pick it up, but she was  _off_ -duty, and more importantly, not in the mood. She hadn't exactly been the most upbeat individual for a while now, but being out of commission for this long meant that there was less to distract her from the cold reality of the betrayal she was actively committing just by being here.

She knew that she had already compromised the ZPD's mission beyond repair with the death of Damien Thornbrush, a death that could have well been prevented if not for her leading that bat straight to him. Sure, he was criminal scum, just like Wilde, but it didn't change the fact that she was now an accessory to murder. He wasn't even the crime lord she  _wanted_  to kill! Reynard could easily keep dangling Sanchez over her head for another two or three kills before she finally got to him. And knowing the fox, he probably would. Her manufactured, bug-ridden badge was in her motel room right now. She wasn't going to let him see her like this. Crushing the same can underfoot, Carla continued down the wooden walkway towards what used to be the boardwalk and was now just another bitter reminder. Why had she come this way? Instinct, or guilt?

Carla elected to find someplace else when she caught sight of the spectacle taking place on the end of one of the piers. Occupied as she was by her own depressed thoughts, she could hardly miss it.  _Who is_ that  _idiota?_

A bead of sweat dripped down the walrus' snout, sifting through his bushy mustache like a filter. The cheers of the crowd were nearly mute compared to the deafening roar of the blood rushing through his body, heartbeat pounding in his eardrums. The rod of iron propped up on his chest, supported by the grip of his flippers, seemed to suck the air out of his lungs, with the pressure straining the muscles in his torso and arms alike. With two barrels full of saltwater tied to each side of the bar, and a pack of hooting porpoises cheering him on from the front, this was the kind of deadlifting experience you only ever got in the Docks.

 _Come on, Ivar...you must lift bar to appease friends...you must_... His brain told him this, yet his body still refused to raise said bar past his chest. The blubber on his abdomen trembled as the muscles hidden behind them hardened with pressure. He tightened his grip on the bar and steadied his stance (even if two measly flippers were all he could hold himself up with), and with a grunt of triumph, jerked the weights above his head. "Graarggh!" The crowd cheered just as loud, and Ivar held the pose for the flurry of blinking cameras that followed.

Carla raised an eyebrow as firmly as he raised that bar. The giant walrus appeared to be making a complete fool of himself in front of his crowd of admirers. Well, it wasn't like she and Priscilla hadn't done similar things before. That thought almost brought a smile back to her muzzle before she remembered that they would most likely never share such a moment again. Growling, Carla stormed past the crowd, intent on passing the big tub of lard by.

With an exhale of air from between his tusks, Ivar dropped the bar to the mats that had been set up atop the wooden stage, causing the barrels tied to the sides to crack open and bust water all over the crowd. The porpoises just blinked before cheering even louder. Such was life as a marine mammal. "Yes! Haha!" Ivar raised his arms to the crowd, flexing the muscles within as hard as he could, even though he still felt like they would liquefy at any moment. " _That_  is how it is  _done!_ No weight can hold back the strength of Ivar the Great! Haha!" More hooting and hollering ensued, and the walrus basked in the limelight.

Yet, as the stage master, a portly sea lion with a scruffy mane of bristling fur, came up with a microphone, Ivar was admittedly relieved to be able to take a back seat. "Alright, folks, there ya have it! The Docks' Annual Strongmammal Competition has a winner - Ivar Obdenberg!" he decreed, coaxing Ivar to flex some more, even in spite of his aching muscles. "As custom with the competition, any mammal from the crowd can have the chance to take some glory of their own in a wrestling match against the victor!" he went on, waving his flippers to the crowd. Even Ivar wasn't sure where that tradition had originated, but given the fact that marine mammals were infamous for boisterousness and hard bodily contact, it wasn't a surprising rule to hear of. "So, who's it gonna be?"

The cheers of the crowd suddenly faded into nervous chuckling. "Anyone?" the stage master asked, scanning the crowd. It was then that his beady eyes locked onto the form of a large female hyena pacing down the other side of the boardwalk, her eyes already trained on the competition. Clearly not a regular at the Docks. A sneer sprouted on the stage master's flabby muzzle. "What about you, Miss?" he called out, pointing to the hyena. The eyes of all the porpoises turned to stare her down.

Carla blinked, already regretting coming this way. Now this, she was  _really_  not in the mood for.

 _Then again...I wanted a distraction, didn't I?_ And she knew from experience that nothing put her in a better mood than a good wrestling match. Especially when she won, and against this blowhard, she didn't see much trouble doing just that. It might actually be kinda fun. "Alright, I'm game," she said, cracking her knuckles and her neck as she stepped forward. "Just don't take this too personally, señor. I've got some  _issues_ to work out."

The stage master beckoned her forward to the platform, presenting the hulking form of Ivar standing proud on the other side of the mat. The walrus slammed his meaty fists together, sending droplets of water squirting out from between his webbed knuckles. "A challenger!" he thundered. "Ivar will smash hyena into pancake! Mmm...pancakes..." His hazy yellow eyes refocused and he cleared his throat. "Come! We will finish this quickly, so Ivar can go and get breakfast at his favorite bar!"

She rolled her eyes. This guy could rival El Orgullo himself in sheer obnoxiousness. Now to see if he was any better at putting his money where his mouth was. "Whatever." She casually gripped the ropes and flung herself into the ring with no effort. Carla was in her element now, and glared at the walrus defiantly. "I'll gladly butter your batter before you go." A few members of the audience snickered for reasons she didn't understand.

"Gahaha!" Ivar guffawed. "So little hyena can dish insults too! Let's see if she can dish out a serving of pain to go with it!" The walrus planted himself on the other side of the ring, leaning forward with his top heavy body in the traditional wrestling ready pose. Past all the bravado, Ivar was doing his best to size up his opponent. She may have been only half his size, and likely a fraction of his weight, but her body was rippling with a surprising amount of muscle, and she carried herself with an aura of confidence that could only have been gained through experience. Something told Ivar that this little hyena would be a more formidable opponent than he first thought. But he had no intention of giving up just yet, and as the stage master hopped up to the side of the platform to serve as referee, Ivar snorted through his nostrils, ejecting out a stream of milky water. He was ready.

As Carla watched the walrus look her over, she realized that she may have underestimated him as well. There was actually some brains behind that big showing of brawn. But she could be pretty clever too. Or at least she liked to think so, and would gladly pulverize anyone who didn't.

"Let the match begin!" the sea lion announced.

As soon as the metaphorical bell rang, Carla rushed right at Ivar. But it was only a feint, to see how he would react.

With a preference for boxing and fisticuffs, Ivar was tempted to bring down his muscular flippers atop the advancing hyena, but knew that move wouldn't fly with the referee. If he wanted to win, he had to do it the right way - the wrestler's way. With a watery growl, he stepped forward and threw his arms out towards her, hoping to grab his foe's shoulders and put her into a lock. He knew that he would have the advantage closer to the ground, thanks to his short legs, but also knew that if his top-heaviness was taken advantage of, he may well be knocked over into a position that would render him defenseless. Putting the hyena into a forward lock and then bringing her to the mat, where his weight would win out, was the best strategy he could come up with.

Ivar's meaty fists grabbed her shoulders, the moist webs of skin between his fingers wrapping around her clavicle like a cape. "Down to ground, dog! Ivar says sit!" the walrus roared before shifting his weight forward and trying to shove the hyena to the mat.

 _Good move._ She was half-expecting him to just throw a punch. The walrus' strategy seemed easy enough to work out, using his greater weight against her for a quick pin. Of course, he didn't realize that she was used to wrestling far above her weight class, to say nothing of her mate. "I'm more closely related to cats, actually. Common misconception." Grabbing onto his arms, Carla slipped under his massive girth, knowing he wouldn't be able to hold her as well if he had to bend over. She then pushed back up and shoved him in the side, breaking the hold and sending him stumbling a few feet away.

Ivar leaned back, trying hard not to topple over. Grunting with surprise, he stomped down like a sumo wrestler as he readjusted his balance. He huffed a few times, taking in several quick breaths of oxygen while he still could. "You are strong!" the walrus bellowed. "But Ivar is stronger!" Without further hesitation, he gathered the biggest burst of energy that his flabby body could muster and then rushed forward, throwing his weight out and wrapping his upper body around the hyena's shoulders. His arms slipped around her sides and gripped against her stomach, and with a heaving grunt, he lifted her up a few feet off the ground before dropping her onto the mat, where she would be the most exposed. He bent down on his knees and tried putting her into a headlock.

Mierde, this guy was fast despite his size. He could hit pretty hard too. It wasn't often that anyone could get ahold of her so easily. But La Mala Perra was not one to give in either. Sensing that he was going for a headlock, Carla beat him to the punch by rocking her own thick skull back into his chin. The sudden counterattack was enough for her to kick out from under him and shift the balance, so that now  _she_  had  _him_  in a headlock, both her arms and legs wrapped around his neck.

"Grk!" Ivar choked. Even despite his superior size and weight, sheer skill could clearly be used to beat him. It reminded him all too much of that time that little bunny had beaten him by tricking him into impaling his precious tusks into the floorboards of a ring.

At the thought of his tusks, an idea suddenly reached him. Instead of trying to maneuver his way out of the headlock, Ivar simply tilted his chin back, causing his tusks to pry the hyena's arms off of his neck like an ivory crowbar. As soon as her grip on his throat was released, Ivar whirled around as fast as he could, grabbing one of the hyena's arms, pulling it around her shoulder, and then pushing down on her opposing shoulder with his other flipper, driving her to the mat, where her face pressed into the ground. He managed to put her into a solid front facing arm-bar. The crowd of seals cheered with delight. "Give up!" Ivar ordered. "Or arm snap like twig!"

"Why...you...uurgh!" Carla strained against the walrus for a bit, but it occurred to her that she had underestimated him fatally this time. Perhaps because she was so used to El Orgullo, that maneuver with his tusks had completely caught her off-guard and now she was paying the price. She didn't want to concede, and maybe she still could've found a way to win this if she were in a better mood, but it wasn't worth the risk of losing an arm. Not for Priscilla's sake. "...Fine, you win! Just get the hell off me!"

The moment the words left the hyena's mouth, the stage master raised his flippers to the air with gusto. "Time! That's it! The winner is Ivar Obdenberg!" he shouted out to the crowd, which immediately uproared with a chorus of watery hooting and wet slapping noises. Ivar chuckled softly, and released his hold on his opponent's arm, allowing her to catch her breath while he gave a thumbs-up to the crowd for another round of pictures. Once the flurry of flashing lights dissipated, the walrus leaned down with a sigh, and extended a meaty flipper to the hyena panting on the ground. "You did well, little hyena. You have Ivar's respect."

"Consider yourself lucky I didn't get the chance to use any of my signature moves," she muttered. She was a bit of a sore loser, but not enough to turn down the offered assistance. She took Ivar's flipper and hoisted herself back up, brushing herself off. "You were pretty good yourself though. You're a lot tougher than the meatheads I usually have to contend with. A lot smarter too."

A laugh escaped Ivar's tusked maw. He thumped his chest with his fist. "Yes, ten centimeters of blubber makes Ivar tough, and keeps him warm!" His head tilted to the side. "You have great skill, and you say you have fights with meatheads before? You must be wrestler of professional level!

She smirked. "You could say that. Not something I want to get into out here in the crowd though." She gestured to the audience of seals still barking and clapping behind them. "But if you don't mind some company at that breakfast place of yours, I might just tell you more there." What the holy infierno was she doing? Distracting herself alright. At least, that's what she told herself.

"Agreed! Regular intake of protein is necessary for building brawny body, and Ivar needs evermore!" He waved his flipper toward the other side of the boardwalk, pointing to a small path that meandered farther down the saltwater canal. "Come. Ivar will treat you to breakfast of champions!"

Carla actually smiled. Maybe this day wasn't turning out so poorly after all. She'd found a worthy new adversary and now she was getting free food. She was glad Reynard wasn't able to see this or she was sure he would ruin it somehow. "Lead the way."

* * *

 

_The Salty Spitoon_

_9: 12 PM_

Together, the two mammals paced deeper into the heart of the Docks, where the buildings stood tall and wide with rickety boards, and the scent of salt and seaweed was thick within the air. They soon reached a large restaurant perched atop dock poles, hovering above the water. The words "How tough are ya?" were alit with neon blue lights on the building's side.

After dealing with the waiters, Ivar and his new hyena friend seated themselves in a large booth in the corner of the eatery. Carla's side of the booth was a bit too large for her, but that came as a relief compared to eating out with the familia. Ivar crashed into his side with an exhale of indulgence, his bushy mustache twitching as the air from his lungs blew through it. "So, where did you learn such formidable fighting skills?" he asked.

"Let me answer your question with a question: how familiar are you with Lucha Libre?"

Ivar laughed like a delighted child. "Oh yes, Ivar has heard great stories of Lucha Libre! Masked heroes of Sahara Square who fight for honor and glory, like El Orgullo, La Niñita, and..." A deep and watery gasp broke through Ivar's words, and he brought his flippers to his muzzle. He pointed a single webbed finger at her in disbelief, having finally put the puzzle pieces together.

For such a tough adversary, his reaction was almost dorky. It brought another smile to her muzzle. "Well, I guess that saves me the trouble of explaining. Yeah, I'm La Mala Perra. Just don't say it too loudly." She looked around, making sure that no one else was watching them. "I'm kind of on hiatus at the moment."

"La Mala Per-!" Ivar shouted, but then clamped his flippers over his mouth to prevent any further words from escaping. He glanced around the room, as if making sure no one had heard him, but everyone seemed too invested in their meals to care. The walrus leaned forward slowly, keeping his yellow eyes locked on the hyena's own. "No wonder you have such skill. You are La Mala Perra! Ivar is huge fan," he whispered between a cupped flipper. "Way you suplexed El Orgullo in tournament three years ago? Ivar couldn't believe his eyes!"

She was trying to remain modest, but all the praise was starting to get to her. Carla looked away, hiding a blush. "Heh. Yeah, I guess that was pretty cool." And considering what the lion did later on, the reminder of her kicking his ass was pretty cathartic. "Like I said, you're lucky I didn't get you into a suplex yourself, heh heh."

"Ivar the Great has never been suplexed before," the walrus claimed proudly, his extra boisterous stage persona taking a momentary hold over his boisterous regular persona. "Too big for most mammals to lift," he said, thumping his chest with a balled-up flipper. "They just try to stick Ivar to ground, ever since fight with bunny went viral on ZooTube." His flabby snout briefly pursed with distaste before his usual expression returned. "Ivar would have loved to see La Mala Perra at tournament! But Ivar cannot go to Sahara Square...air makes his skin peel." He let out a bitter sigh. "Must remain here in Docks, or Tundra Town."

 _A bunny? That can't possibly be the same one I'm thinking of._  But what other bunny could stand up to  _this_  guy? She needed to look up that ZooTube video later. "That's a shame. You certainly deserve to be there more than some mammals." Shoving her own bitterness aside, she nudged him playfully in the arm. "But hey, how about I give you my number and you can give me a call whenever you want to get your butt whupped?" she laughed. "Might even find out what it's like being suplexed."

"Gahaha!" Ivar chuckled good-naturedly. "If La Mala Perra can manage to lift Ivar even two inches off of ground, he will pay her hospital bill for dislocated vertebrae." His laughter subsided as he let out a sigh of indulgence. "Yes, Ivar will take phone number."

"Glad to hear it." She ripped off a piece of napkin and wrote her cell number down on it, then slid it back. "I could use something to take my mind off of...current events anyway." She looked away again, this time out of shame.

Ivar's small head tilted to the side, causing his tusks to swish through the air like blades. "You seem distressed. What is wrong?"

She sighed. "...You've been following Lucha, right? So you must know what happened to my old partner, La Niñita." Carla wasn't sure if she really wanted to talk about this, but it didn't matter. The words kept spilling out regardless. "At least, you heard the version Sanchez wanted you to hear. A freak training accident, right?" She looked at him pointedly, seeing the surprise on his face. "But the truth is, Priscilla was crippled deliberately. By El Orgullo, under Sanchez's orders."

"That is horrible!" The walrus slammed a meaty fist down on the table, nearly breaking it in half. "Ivar would have strong words with mammals responsible!" His anger quickly faded as he took note of the hyena's dejected expression. He exhaled softly from his fleshy nostrils. "If you know this, why do you not go to ZPD? Make mammals responsible pay for crimes?"

She let out a humorless laugh. "Well, that's the thing. I already have. Remember when I said I'm on hiatus? That's because I'm now Carla Hyenandez, ZPD officer." She reached into her jeans for a badge she remembered too late wasn't there. "You'll have to take my word for it. But that's the plan. Use my new position to put the hurt on Sanchez and El Orgullo." She didn't feel much better letting that all out. Of course, that wasn't what was truly bothering her in the first place, and she couldn't tell  _that_ to anyone. It was less like letting the floodgates spill open and more like just letting a small stream trickle out.

Ivar scratched at his chin. "You will spearhead investigation to bring down bad guys? Ivar approves!" he exclaimed, slapping the table with a flipper.

"That's the plan anyway," she said, managing a slight smile again just through this mammal's sheer enthusiasm. It was contagious. To think, fans used to say the same about her manic laughter, which often echoed throughout the entire room after a win.

"La Niñita will be avenged and La Mala Perra will return to ring as hero!"

She flinched. "I don't know about a hero…"

"La Mala Perra will be hero to herself and her partner," Ivar said in a surprisingly soft voice. "That is what matters most."

Carla was taken aback by the shift in tone. "You might be right." At least about Priscilla. Even if her mate never found out what she had to do to get her revenge, Carla wasn't sure she could ever forgive herself.

"Ivar  _is_  right," the walrus insisted. "He has learned much from years of boxing and competition. Performing for crowds, hurting others for entertainment..." He trailed off, eyes slinking to the side. "Ivar has learned that through pain and glory, mammals will hate you. Mammals will want to make you hurt." He lifted his flippers and stared down at them as though they were weapons he could never be free of. "But if Ivar does what must be done, does that make him bad mammal?" His gaze lifted and locked with Carla's. "No. It makes Ivar hero to himself and his supporters. You too will be hero - Hero to partner for bringing justice. If not hero to her, than hero to yourself for doing right thing, even if it came through pain and glory."

This poor guy. She could tell how much he was trying to help her, and hear the sincerity in his words, but he was lacking critical information. Information that complicated this issue significantly more than he made it out to be. Carla was no hero. She could never be a hero after betraying her friends and family, no matter the reason. But she wasn't going to express that, for it would only make Ivar continue his futile efforts to cheer her up.

Actually...they weren't entirely futile. To her own surprise, she did feel a little better. With Ivar's tremendous spirit and livelihood, it was hard not to. As a reward for his tenacity, she gave him what he wanted, laughing and smiling with glee. "Alright then. If you're going to be so insistent about it, maybe I  _will_  be a hero!"

Ivar's muzzle broke with a grin. "That is spirit! La Mala Perra will be victorious!" He waved down a waiter, a portly elephant seal, that promptly approached the table with notepad in flipper. "But no great victory can be achieved without good protein. We will eat breakfast of champions!" Once the waiter reached the table, Ivar slapped his fist on their shoulder. "Yuri! You are here! Your restaurant has grown much in past few months."

The elephant seal smiled. "It sure has. We just got a new shipment of sea urchin cores from a new seller: a fox out in Savanna Central. Great price too! We can get you some, if you'd like."

"Ivar will take his usual - Porridge with scallops." He then turned toward Carla. "What will you take?"

Honestly, with everything else going through her mind at the time, she hadn't even thought about her choice of meal. "Uh...smoked trout. And crab legs on the side."

Yuri wrote down their orders before parting. "Good choice. Though Ivar prefers porridge with scallops," he muttered before crossing his arms and leaning forward. "So what will La Mala Perra do once she has won her great victory and silly Sanchez is defeated?"

 _Go to jail probably._  "Get back in the ring probably. If there's anything tonight's match helped me realize, it's that I'm just not satisfied unless I'm slamming someone's face into the floor. It's probably what my family would want too."  _Shame they'll never see it._

Ivar laughed, clapping his flippers together excitedly. "La Mala Perra will return to ring? Awesome! Ivar would love to see next fight on television!"

"I'm sure it'll really be something."  _When I get convicted of conspiracy and murder_. She really needed to take her mind off of this. "Hey...I've talked a lot about myself so far, but what about you? What's your story, big guy?"

"Hmm..." The walrus stroked his chin. "Ivar was born in West Philadolphia - Large neighborhood here in Docks - And grew up watching fighting on television! All kinds of fighting! I look to mother and say, Ivar wants to do that! Then she say, Ivar will do that. So Ivar did! Now Ivar lives in Tundra Town, and competes there, and here in Docks too, for honor and glory." He pumped a fist with determination.

It took her a second to realize that he was finished. To be fair, she couldn't see herself describing her own upbringing in much more detail. Parents killed, adopted by rats, raised by rats, married a rat. "Sounds like you have some pretty clear goals. I like that. Good that your familia was supportive too." She paused, realizing how that sounded. "Don't get me wrong, so was mine...after a while. Though I'm pretty sure they were more worried about Priscilla."

"Family will do what is best for family. That is what makes them so," Ivar said as he leaned back in his booth, the leathery texture of the seating squeaking beneath his massive weight. "Priscilla is partner, La Niñita, yes? You say partner was crippled. Family would be worried for good reason. But La Mala Perra will avenge her and earn family's approval as great hero!"

 _No I won't, no I won't, no I won't!_ Right when she thought they were moving past this topic, it reared its ugly head again. She couldn't take it anymore. The guilt was overpowering already and this oblivious walrus was only making it worse. "STOP CALLING ME THAT!"

Panting with exertion, Carla didn't realize just how loud her outburst had been until she noticed the entire restaurant staring at her. So much for not drawing attention. Ashamed, she bit her lip and stared down at the floor, unwilling to look Ivar in the eye, or let him see how close she was to tears. "L-Lo siento. I just...please, stop talking about this. I'm not a hero. I'm not..." And she had failed. Now she was crying.  _Hijo de puta._

The hyena's outburst had admittedly fazed the walrus. But it only took moments for his bushy eyebrows to sink back down, and for his surprise to leave him. He could tell that Carla was hiding something, and that something was eating away at her like frostbite. It was unfortunate that it had only taken him till now to realize just how severe it was.

One of Ivar's flippers pushed itself forward and took Carla's paw in its grasp. She resisted for a moment, nearly pulling away, before Ivar tightened his grip, and she subsequently relaxed her arm. Ivar had been told before that the chill of his skin was soothing, like an ice pack. He hoped this gesture would be a calming one. He may have been boisterous, but he was nothing if not empathetic too. "Ivar has met mammals who see themselves as burden to others, and hide pain behind smile. He knows of narwhal here in Docks who spends all his time by himself, drinking and smoking on boat. No family. Only Ivar is his friend. Narwhal always calls Ivar mean things, but Ivar is still narwhal's friend because he knows that he needs him, and appreciates him, even if he doesn't show it. Ivar sees same darkness in you."

He hesitated, nearly addressing the hyena by her stage name again. "Carla," the walrus continued. "He sees same draining parasite, like barnacle growing on boardwalk. Carla tries to hide pain inside, but you must not let pain become part of you." His grip tightened on her arm. "Ivar is sorry for calling you hero. You may not see yourself as one, Carla, but you are hero to Ivar."

It was so touching that she couldn't possibly stay mad. She gripped his flipper tightly (he was right, it  _was_ a bit soothing) and managed a weak smile, one last tear rolling down her cheek. He wasn't the only one who had been oblivious. Even if he barely knew her, the real her anyway, Ivar was willing to burden himself with her pain and be her friend just because he was that good of a mammal. It made her almost envious. "Gracias, Ivar. Gracias. I suppose...being your hero is good enough for me."

A smile pulled on Ivar's muzzle. He gingerly held her paw for as long as he had to. "You are good mammal, Carla. Ivar is glad he met you." The walrus' eyes flickered over to Yuri as the waiter set two plates of food down on their table and walked off without a word. "Now let us eat. Smoked trout is good for replenishing sodium," he said with a smile, taking note of the glistening pathways shining on her cheeks.

"Urk!" Carla hurriedly wiped away the rest of her tears, the moment officially over and her natural disdain of all things mushy reasserting itself. "Yes! Let's!" Overcompensating just a bit, Carla attempted to sink her teeth right into the heated fish and tear a big chunk out. She succeeded, but not without scalding her mouth on the freshly-cooked meal. This ended up making her eyes water even further as she beat a paw against the table, struggling for a few seconds until she got it down. She wearily shot Ivar a thumbs-up like nothing had happened.

The walrus threw his head back and laughed with vigor. "See? You eat well, Carla! Feel better very soon. Now, let Ivar show you how he eats!" the walrus said before digging one of his flippers into the bowl of porridge in front of him, which was easily the size of an adult rabbit, and used his webbed fingers like a spoon to shovel a handful of milky scallops into his mouth. His bushy mustache dripped with white liquid, and he gave a thumbs-up of his own, knuckles clanking against Carla's like a fist-bump.

Carla gladly returned the gesture. She couldn't help but laugh, the only surefire way to make her feel better. Her family had figured out as much long ago and used it to great (and often torturous) effect. Now, even after everything that had happened, Ivar and his own clownish antics continued to achieve a similar result. It was incredible that any one mammal could make her feel like this again. Feeling a little playful, she discreetly slid her fork under the flesh of her smoked trout, and with a small flick, sent a chunk of it flying into Ivar's mustache as well. This made her laugh even harder.

The only reaction Ivar had to Carla's food attack was a single blink. Without words, he grabbed a handful of porridge from his bowl before throwing it at Carla's head, laughing with delight as it splat against her face, nearly drenching it entirely. "Take that!" he thundered.

Carla just sat there for a few seconds, letting the porridge drip off of her face. She saw the challenging look in his eyes and knew that she had truly found another equal, just like Priscilla. For the sake of not getting him kicked out of his favorite restaurant, she decided to forgo her first instinct to start a full-scale food fight and settled for a tie, wiping the foodstuff up calmly with a napkin. "Touché."

Ivar looked down into his porridge, grumbling beneath his breath. "Carla is afraid," he taunted.

Welp. He asked for it. Carla casually moved her arms below the table, and proceeded to flip its entire contents onto Ivar's head.

Ivar's yelp was cut off as the porridge bowl sunk into his face, and the salmon from Carla's breakfast blasted into pieces across his chest as the table smushed into him. The walrus fell out of his booth, ripped the bowl of porridge from his face and then whirled around on Carla, staring her down with yellow eyes glowing through a mask of watery oatmeal and scallops. "Round two, then!" he announced as he grabbed a plateful of donuts from a passing waiter and then tossed them all straight at his opponent.

From across the diner, Yuri's voice rang out, "Ivar, not again!"

Carla dove to the floor to avoid the round and fluffy projectiles. She ran to another food cart, shoving her arms into a tank of water and snatching up a pair of live lobsters, wielding them like combat knives as she leapt in for another attack. She already knew that this battle would be long and bloody, but there could only be one winner. This may not have been a long-term solution to her problem, but boy did it make for one hell of a distraction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Usually, when two big characters fight like this in a crossover, there's never a clear winner. Here there was, but to be fair, Carla was pretty off her game. :P (Let the debate commence!)
> 
> But the true essence of this meetup was to find someone who could break through Carla's hard shell and show her more vulnerable side. Due to being a twist and all, the true extent of what this guilt was doing to her never really came up before the reveal. Now you get to see how screwed up she's been this whole time! Fun, right?
> 
> Again, this drabble was a bit of an experiment. In a medium like this, we have a bit more freedom to do stuff like this as opposed to the main story. But should we? Let us know what you think.
> 
> Ivar Obdenberg comes from When Instinct Falls and belongs to Upplet. Also note, the narwhal Ivar mentions is a character from his own story and has nothing to do with OUR narwhal.


	8. The Sassifier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Father's Day! Yep, we did this again!
> 
> A bit soon for another Simon drabble perhaps, but Jack came up with this idea out of the blue and we both just fell in love with it. You should know up front that this is not a continuation of Drabble 4, but does provide some more insight into our favorite ringtailed merc regardless. You saw him in his element back in the Cold-Blooded War, and now you get to see him...significantly less so. :P

 

**Drabble 8: The Sassifier**

_The Meadowlands_

_VanDal Household_

_7: 33 PM_

_Simon entered the dark room, his knife drawn and his senses even sharper. The metal door slammed shut behind him of its own volition, plunging him into complete blackness. With his night vision, he could see to some degree around him, but his enemies were crafty and hid in the shadows. And he had no doubt there_ were  _enemies. There were always enemies._

_He had dreams like this almost every night now. It was like his subconscious was trying to keep his skills active even three decades after the end of the Cold-Blooded War. After long becoming lucid to them, Simon started to treat these flights of fancy as dedicated simulation training. "Alright, any time, guys. I don't have all night."_

_The enemy attacked. It started simple: two Sauriat monitor lizards, dressed in their traditional red uniforms and wielding combat knives of their own. They jumped out at him from the shadows and struck from opposite sides, leaving no room to dodge._

_Simon didn't need to. His left paw reached up and grabbed the reptile's wrist, twisting it roughly and making him drop the knife. His right paw slammed down on the other attacker's elbow, causing his arm to buckle and the knife to swerve past him. All of this without using his own knife, which he now turned in his grip and plunged into the chest of the second reptile. The soldier gurgled, but Simon didn't waste any time and quickly pulled the knife back out, spinning on his heel and slashing it across the throat of the first reptile before he could recover. The motion completed, Simon stood in place as the two reptiles dropped to the floor around him. "Next."_

_Next was something a bit more challenging. From the shadows around him, he heard a chorus of hissing and then serpentine soldiers began to leap out at him, venomous fangs bared and ready to sink into his tender flesh._

_Simon swung upwards and sliced the first snake's jaw clean open, unhinging it even more than usual. Before the snake even hit the floor, Simon had killed the next one, anticipating their lunges and cutting them down before any got too close. They then started to attack in groups, forcing Simon to dodge some lunges and counter others based on tactical priority. They brushed up against his uniform a few times, but none landed their deadly bite._

_Soon enough, Simon was surrounded by a ring of snake corpses and covered in enough reptile blood to lower his body temperature. "Next."_

_There was a sharp click from behind him and Simon dove just as a hail of bullets tore past him. He might've been hindered by the snake bodies, but the snake bodies were gone, like the lizard bodies before them. If only real combat cleaned up after itself as efficiently as the dream world._

_There were other perks as well. For one, the version of Compact Cobra now attacking him possessed all the skill of the original, but was completely and mercifully silent. A huge improvement._

_Simon withdrew his Silver Centurion, which he never had fighting the real Cobra but was too good not to use, and fired back at him from behind a metal column. As expected, Cobra contorted around the shots and slithered right for him, switching to his knife attachment as he did so. Simon switched in turn and the two began to clash blades just like old times, neither gaining an immediate advantage over the other._

_In some iterations of this dream, their battle played through to completion. Other times,_ this  _happened._

_Cobra suddenly lurched, not making a sound even in his death throes, and crumpled to the floor, his body disappearing right before Simon's eyes. "Honey, is that you again?"_

" _The one and only," said Karen, stepping out of the shadows with her own favored blade. "Honestly, I don't know why you bother with the rest of these losers. I'm the only one who can still challenge you."_

" _What, I thought you enjoyed foreplay," Simon replied, winking slyly._

" _Shut up." She shifted into her stance and charged._

" _That's my girl." Simon charged back, and the two raccoons fought like he had forgotten their anniversary again._

" _Daaaaaad!" a voice echoed from seemingly everywhere at once._

_Simon tried to ignore it, focusing on the battle. One mistake and he was finished._

" _Daaaaaaaaaaad!"_

_Stab, parry, parry, dodge, slash, parry, stab, parry, dodge-_

" _Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad!"_

_Parry, slash, parry, SHIT!_

_Simon's knife went hurtling out of his paw, and Karen pressed hers firmly against his throat. "You had better wake up and take care of our son, or I am going to kick your physical_ and  _metaphysical ass!"_

Simon woke up.

The raccoon yawned, finding himself not in bed, but on an armchair in the living room. He wasn't  _that_ old yet. Not that he could tell when he'd had gray hairs since kithood.

Their home was humble, but comfortable. Two floors, two bedrooms, three bathrooms, even a backyard pool. The Meadowlands were a fairly wealthy suburb, but while the VanDals could've afforded something better, given the size of their Delta Fox settlement, that usually meant having to deal with all the pompous sheep that made this district their own. Staying in the middle rung with their fellow predators and more tolerable prey was vastly preferable over, say, having a hot tub on the roof.

Besides, Simon liked his privacy. Out here, at least most of their neighbors knew better than to think he wanted to go bowling on Sundays. Not that he couldn't afford to get out more. Simon was just as badass as ever in his dreams, but real life hadn't been so kind. Instead of his combat gear and beret, he sported a pair of jeans and a distastefully-named red wife beater. Instead of his toned muscles and sleek physique, he had unkempt fur and a noticeable pooch. Though he would never say it aloud, Simon actually kinda  _missed_ the war.

But atop his pooch sat one of the two reasons he wouldn't give this up for the world. Kyle VanDal was a bit runty, even for a ten-year-old, wearing a pair of shorts and a striped shirt, along with a pair of taped glasses and one of the dorkiest smiles he had ever seen. "There you are! What were you dreaming about, Dad? Fighting the scalies again?"

Simon felt the presence of death and looked to the kitchen, where Karen had been busily preparing dinner. Her knife had ceased chopping vegetables, and she glared at him as if contemplating chopping something else. The dream version of her had been scarily accurate.

He cleared his throat nervously. "Now, son...what did I tell you about using that word? We just call them reptiles now, remember?"

"Okaaaaaaay…" Kyle said, pouting childishly. Naturally, he disregarded this seconds later. "So do you think they call  _us_ 'furries'?"

Simon pretended to contemplate this. "Well, Zootopia  _is_ pretty furry."

"I knew it!" Kyle cheered, bouncing up and down on his belly. "The evidence speaks for itself, Your Honor! I rest my case!"

And this, Simon noted, was what happened when your ten-year-old son decided he really wanted to become a lawyer. He smiled and patted his head. "Yes, yes...Not Guilty, whatever."

He huffed. "No, Dad, I'm gonna be a prosecutor! I  _want_ Guilty! Get it right!"

"Of course." He gently lifted Kyle under the arms and set him down on the carpeted floor. "Just remember, you may joke about it now, but the Cold-Blooded War was serious business. Your father was lucky to make it home in one piece." He pulled a lever on the side of his chair, extending a footrest that he plopped his two black-furred feet on top of. "Understand?"

" _Serious business,"_ Kyle echoed dramatically.

"Close enough." He yawned again and closed his eyes in an attempt to get back to his nap.

As expected, Kyle didn't pick up on the hint. "Hey, do you think you can tell my friends some of your war stories when they get here? They don't get that one about how you beat Compact Cobra by changing the way you talk."

"I...don't think I could explain that any better," he admitted, cracking one eye open and peering back into the kitchen. "Besides, I bet you'll all be too busy enjoying your mother's famous brownies anyway."

Through some kind of motherly sixth sense, or eavesdropping, Karen picked up on that immediately. "I hope you didn't forget that I'm going to an IA conference tonight," she said, packing the salad she had made for herself into a tupperware container. "You'll have to handle Kyle's sleepover yourself. That's not going to be a  _problem,_  is it?"

Simon snapped both eyes open, feeling like he'd just had his throat slit after all. "No...of course not." Trying to keep track of  _one_ kit was hard enough sometimes, but  _three_ of them? He'd woken up from a dream and into a nightmare.

"If it's too much trouble,  _I_  could watch over them," said a timid, squeaky voice. Over by the television, the old-school kind with a dial and antenna, a hedgehog in a plain white shirt, baggy pants, and a bandanna wrapped around her head was busily dusting the surface, using a rag she hung from her quills. "I'm not doing anything else tonight. I could stay a little later and keep them company. You don't have to pay me overtime or anything."

Simon was sorely tempted for a second, but shook his head. "No, Reina. You're our housekeeper, not our kitsitter. It wouldn't be right to dump this on you. But thanks anyway."

Reina looked a little disappointed, but nodded and went back to her dusting, popping in a pair of headphones from a cassette player she always carried around. 

Soon enough, Reina finished her duties and departed for the night, as did Karen, giving Simon a peck on the cheek before she left for her conference. "Good luck. Try not to blow the house up."

And then his better half was gone, leaving him alone with Kyle. "I'm gonna go look out the window for their car!" he abruptly announced, bounding out of the room on all-fours.

Simon sighed, leaning back in his chair. At least he could try to formulate some kind of plan of attack before-

"They're here!"

He muttered something under his breath that he was grateful Kyle wasn't around for. Looking up at the clock, he saw that it was only 7:50.  _They said 8, dammit!_

Alright, he was knee-deep in unknown territory, threat level as of yet undetermined, and operating under faulty intel. This was going to be rough. But Simon had dealt with worse odds, and he rose from his seat to answer the door the second the bell rang.

Kyle was already out there, having apparently gone  _through_ the window. The raccoon kit was standing near two others now. One was a slightly-plump badger in a blue t-shirt and shorts. The other was a possum girl in a red, oversized sweater and jeans. Both came equipped with sleeping bags, while the girl also carried a squirrel doll with swirly eyes and big teeth. "Hi, Mr. VanDal!" they greeted.

"Hello, Eric. Delilah," he said, waving a little and trying to sound enthused. He didn't  _dislike_ kits by any means; he just had no idea how to interact with them.

"Have fun, you two!" a much more cheerful voice yelled from a red minivan, which quickly sped off before Simon could ask some very pressing questions about how to take care of his offspring. His eyes narrowed.  _Clever tactic, Mr. O'Possum. This round goes to you._

As soon as the van was gone, he felt a tug on his shirt and found Eric looking up at him with those big, adorable eyes that completely failed to move him. "Excuse me, Mr. VanDal. Did your wife make more of those delicious brownies for us? I've been looking forward to them all day."

He hesitated. "Well...she's not actually here tonight. So no, she didn't."

"No brownies?" Those big, adorable eyes began to tear up. "B-But we l-love her b-brownies..." And then Eric started crying, way too loudly and over-the-top for a kit his age.

"Now look what you did! You made Ricky cry!" Delilah said accusingly, waving her little finger at him.

 _Five minutes in unknown territory and I'm already under fire._ "Now, hold on!" Simon said hurriedly. "What if...what if  _I_ made the brownies instead?"

"Y-You can do t-that, Mr. VanDal?" the little drama queen sniffled.

 _Abort mission! Abort mission!_ "Of course."

"Awesome!" Eric cheered up instantly and rushed right inside to boot up the PreyStation, with Delilah following close behind, giving Simon nothing more than a playful punch in the leg for his trouble.

Kyle was the last inside, smirking knowingly up at him. "Are you sure about this, Dad? You and I both know you've never baked a thing in your life."

"How hard can it be?" he asked stubbornly. "Now go play your silly picture games."

Kyle shrugged and went to do just that while Simon closed the door and made his way into the kitchen, panicking internally.  _I've been given an assignment I don't know how to complete. The first step is to survey my surroundings and gather intel._

The first thing he saw was a sticky note attached to the fridge:

" _I know you're hopeless without me, so I left my brownie recipe out for you. Follow the instructions_ _carefully_ _. I was serious about not blowing up the house. Love, Karen."_

Emergency orders! Just what he needed! Simon might've kissed the note if he weren't at risk of being spotted by the enemy. He soon found the recipe book on the nearby counter, already opened to the page he needed. "Butter, sugar, eggs, cocoa powder...yes, I can obtain these things."

As the sounds of technological mayhem and juvenile taunts faded into the background, Simon preheated the oven to 350°, then set to work finding each of the principal components, putting them together on the counter for assembly along with a big metal bowl to use as a storage container. He threw on an apron and flexed his fingers. "Now...let us begin."

With the recipe open right next to him, Simon initiated assembly of the brownies, not only following the instructions carefully, but refusing to deviate in the slightest. It said half a cup of butter, and he ensured it was half a cup  _exactly._ He cracked the eggs like he cracked skulls, with pinpoint precision and in as few pieces as possible. The other ingredients were dropped in, and then he stirred as forcefully as he could muster, refusing to allow any of the components to resist alignment.

A bit messier than when he started, Simon poured the mixture into a square metal pan and stuck it into the oven, setting the timer for twenty minutes.  _Excellent. The formula is completed. That wasn't so hard, after all._

Simon turned around, and jumped when he saw Delilah standing right behind him. It had been a while since anyone were able to sneak up behind him, which spoke either to this kit's potential or his own waning abilities. He didn't wish to entertain either notion. "Mr. VanDal, are the brownies done yet? We're hungry."

 _A complication._ "I just put them in...uh, sweetie. They'll be ready in twenty minutes."

"But we're huuuuuuuuuuuuungry!" she insisted, as if time itself flowed by the emptiness of their stomachs. "Isn't that right, Ricky?" she called into the other room.

"T-They're not d-done y-yet?"

Simon needed to act fast or the badger bomb was going to go off again. "W-Wait, hold on! They'll be done soon! I promise!"

"Thankies!" Delilah said, skipping back into the other room. If they were already this skilled at manipulation, they would have no problem becoming lawyers.

Now how to handle this dilemma. There seemed to be no way out unless he could make time itself speed up.

 _Maybe I can._ He took a step back and looked at the problem logically, putting his analytical mind to work. If the brownies needed to be baked for twenty minutes at 350°...then of course! They should only take ten minutes at 700°!

Simon grinned and cranked the oven up, pleased at his own cunning. He hadn't lost his touch after all.

* * *

_Ten Minutes Later_

"Here." Simon dumped the plate of brownies in front of the enemy, watching them sniff the air distastefully and look down with concern at what could more accurately be called blackies.

"Um...Mr. VanDal, are you sure you made these right?" Eric asked.

"And did your face mask get bigger?" Delilah added.

Simon smiled dangerously through the massive scorch mark covering his face. "Do you want them... _or not?"_

They ate every bite.

Groaning uncomfortably and rubbing his stomach, Kyle pushed the empty plate aside and picked up his game controller again. "Hey, Dad, wanna join in on  _Claw of Duty?_ I think there's a few levels based on the Cold-Blooded War."

"Yes, I would love to partake in a fictional and likely misrepresented version of a real war that I actually could've died in."

The three kits just stared for a moment until Eric slowly passed a controller to him.

"Sarcasm, Eric."

"Then tell us more about the  _real_ war!" Delilah said, leaning over the side of the couch and beaming up at him. "We still wanna know what went down with Compact Cobra!"

"Told you," Kyle noted.

Figuring he was a better source than whatever this on-screen junk told them, Simon plopped back down in his chair and was instantly surrounded, Kyle back on his belly, Eric clinging to the armrest, and Delilah hanging by her tail from the top. "Right...now, let's forget about Cobra. Permanently, if able. Wouldn't you rather hear about what happened  _next?"_

"Oooooooooh!" The three kits grinned and nodded in agreement. At least he knew  _some_ of their weaknesses.

"Alright, we'll pick up right after the battle. As you recall, I was bitten in the leg, but immediately remembered I had an antivenin and injected it…"

" _Do you have any idea where I'm going now?" Simon asked, lumbering down the steel corridor. His leg still throbbed a little, but the worst of it was over and it would soon recover._

" _Let's see...you seem to be heading towards the jail cells, Hot Fuzz," Karen observed. "So I_ guess  _you should go save White Fox first. Maybe she'll have some intel on how to shut down Metal Shell and actually be useful for once."_

" _Did White Fox, like, kill your family or something?"_

" _Not important. Anyway, it looks like the inside of Outer Heatin' is a lot more fortified than the outside. I'm seeing a lot of guards around the place. You'll have to be real sneaky here."_

" _Not a problem." Simon entered the prison from an upper walkway, glancing down at the multitude of Sauriat guards patrolling the area. There was about a dozen of them. Nodding to himself, Simon dropped down to the lower floor and hid himself behind an air conditioner, waiting for a lizard to pass by. From there, he made his way towards White Fox's cell, remaining out of sight._

"Booooooo!" the kits yelled.

"What? That's how it happened."

"But that's boring!" Delilah argued. "Weren't you some kinda super soldier? Why didn't you just take 'em all out?"

Simon facepalmed. "This is exactly why I hate video games. War isn't that simple! Maybe I  _could've_ beaten them all, but not unscathed, and they would've just called in more and more until I was dead!"

She crossed her arms and pouted, which looked especially silly when she was upside-down. "Fiiiiiiiiine. So what happened next?"

_Simon swiped a stolen keycard across the reader to White Fox's cell and slipped inside. The captured mercenary was huddled up in the corner, donning a black uniform with the Delta Fox emblem. "Finally, they send someone here," the Arctic vixen said, smiling up at him. "I have information that can help you take down Big Boa and Metal Shell. First, I'll list its technical readouts-"_

Delilah made a loud snoring noise.

" _-and that's everything you need to know," White Fox finished._

" _Thank you, White Fox," Simon said. "I'm sure that information will be vital to completing my mission."_

" _Ask her if she thinks she can manage to get out of here without getting shot and/or recaptured," Karen told him._

" _Do you think you can escape on your own?" Simon asked._

" _Of course. I'm not Delta Fox for nothing."_

_Karen snorted as White Fox headed past them and slipped away. "Seriously, if she doesn't make it, we're not going back for her."_

" _Honey, be professional."_

" _Oh, fine. But Metal Shell first."_

_He begrudgingly agreed. "Right. So now that we know [insert technical stuff here], we should be able to destroy Metal Shell with [insert method of destruction here]."_

" _Affirmative."_

"Can we just skip to the part where you destroy Metal Shell now?" Eric asked.

"Sure, why not? It's not like this was one of the most important missions of my life or anything."

"Yay!"

" _So you finally made it, Maskovich!" laughed a very large boa constrictor with green and black coloring and wearing an eyepatch. "Behold, the unstoppable Metal Shell!"_

_A giant door beneath the hanger opened and a mechanical monstrosity was slowly lifted to the surface. It was dark green and in the general shape of a tortoise, hefted up on four legs and weighted down by a thick shell patterned with hexagons. On its back, a menacing railgun was pointed up into the sky, from which Simon assumed its nuclear shells were meant to be fired. The head of Metal Shell was comically small in comparison, and didn't seem to serve much purpose other than glaring at him with glowing red eyes._

" _An impressive piece of craftsmanship, isn't it?" Boa asked tauntingly. "Soon, Metal Shell will rain destruction upon your precious Zootopia, and the Sauriat Union shall dance upon its remains!" He frowned, seeing the very unimpressed look on Simon's face. "Alright, why do you look so bored?"_

_He shrugged. "Oh, it seems pretty dangerous and all, don't get me wrong. It's just...I've seen it before."_

" _When?!"_

" _When I was planting explosive charges on it."_

_A series of explosions rocked the hanger as Metal Shell's legs began to cave in from under it. Its top heavy structure made for an imposing weapon, but also its most critical weakness. "No!" Big Boa shouted._

" _Yes." Simon leapt forward and kicked Boa square in the jaw, propelling him back until he slid right underneath the collapsing tank. He had the time only to let out a girly scream before he was crushed under the might of his own ultimate weapon._

_Simon smirked. "Mission accomplished."_

"Booooooooooooooo!" the kits yelled even louder.

"That's how it happened!" Simon insisted. "It's not  _my_ fault the commander was an idiot too!"

"But that's so lame though!" Delilah said. "He had this giant, mechanical death tortoise and he didn't even get to  _use_ it?!"

"It  _is_ a bit anticlimactic," Kyle admitted.

"What do you want me to do?" Simon asked, annoyed. "Just  _make up_ some epic battle?"

"Yeah!" they enthusiastically agreed.

Simon looked up at the clock. It was just past 9.  _Finally, my extraction!_ "Well, too bad. It's bedtime. The moral of the story? Real life is disappointing."

The response was predictable. "Awwwww, do we have to?" Kyle whined.

" _My_  dad lets me stay up until midnight!" Delilah bragged.

"Actually...I'm usually in bed by now anyway…" Eric admitted.

"Then it's a shame you're in my house and operating under my rules," he said simply. He pointed a sharp finger upstairs. "Bed."

The kits groaned, but grabbed their things and headed upstairs anyway, with Delilah taking the time to blow a raspberry at him on the way.

With the enemy falling back, Simon soon put his feet back up and tried to find something good on TV. He wasn't foolish enough to think, even for a second, that they would actually go straight to bed. But kits would be kits. As long as they didn't kill each other up there, he was content to leave them be.

"Murderer! Murderer!" Kyle screamed.

Simon reacted instantly, pulling a knife from under his seat cushion and rushing upstairs. He was about to throw open the door to Kyle's room when his son yelled again. "The court hereby accuses Ms. O'Possum of the murder of Mr. Stuffycheeks!"

He let out a sigh of relief, hiding the knife in the back of his jeans and much more softly opening the door.

Inside was a sight to behold. In the short time since they'd left him, the three kits had managed to turn a fairly average boy's bedroom into a courtroom. On his left side, behind a stack of pillows, was Kyle, looking much more professional than usual and ruffling a poorly-drawn picture of the family like an official legal document. On the opposite side was Eric, repeatedly slamming his paw onto his pillow stack in an effort to look intimidating. Between them, with her back to him, Delilah was sitting under an overturned crib they had apparently dug out of the closet. "I'm innocent! I'm innocent, I tells ya!"

 _What fresh hell have I just wandered into?_ "Dare I ask what's going on in here?"

All three of them turned towards him, having only just noticed him now. "Oh, hi Dad. We're just trying to solve the murder of Mr. Stuffycheeks," Kyle answered, pointing to a squirrel doll with a pen stabbed through its chest. Simon realized it was the same doll Delilah had brought here with her, and wondered with morbid curiosity if she had done so purely to "murder" it.

"I see. And do you recall me telling you all to go to bed?"

" _ **Objection!"**_ shouted the defense, prosecution,  _and_ defendant.

_I really should've seen that one coming._

"We can't go to bed while there's a murderer at large!" Eric protested.

"That would be a travesty of the criminal justice system!" Kyle agreed.

In Simon's humble opinion, Zootopia's criminal justice system was  _already_  a travesty. "So what you're telling me is that you're not going to sleep until you solve the case?"

"Of course!" Kyle said. He could practically see the lightbulb appear above his head. "Hey...why don't you join in, Dad? We still need a judge! All we've got is Mr. Kangs, but…" He whispered. "Between you and me, I don't trust him to give an impartial verdict."

Simon looked up at the kangaroo doll sitting on Kyle's bed, a toy mallet crudely glued to its paw.

He sighed. "Is there really no other way you'll go to sleep?"

"Nope!" all three cheerfully responded.

 _If I need to go undercover to neutralize the enemy, so be it._ "Alright...so all I have to do is sit there and agree or disagree with stuff, right?"

"Pretty much," Kyle said, shrugging.

"Fine." Simon moved across the room and hopped up on the bed, casually shoving Mr. Kangs out of the way. "Proceed."

Kyle cleared his throat. "Right. Um...as I saying, Ms. O'Possum was seen fleeing the scene of the crime at, uh, 9:00 PM, right around the confirmed time of death! And...that's more or less my opening statement, so let's hear testimony from the defendant!"

Delilah trembled, making her best show of being a poor, falsely-accused mammal. "Oh, woe is me! If I must!"

_Witness Testimony - I'm Totally Innocent!_

_I would never kill Mr. Stuffycheeks! He was my bestest friend ever!_

_At the time of the murder, I was upstairs, powdering my face!_

_When I came down to check on Mr. Stuffycheeks, he was just laying there in the middle of the kitchen! Murdered!_

_So I immediately got out of there and called the police from my cell phone!_

_But they brought me in, saying_ I  _did it! Why, the nerve of those mammals!_

Simon rested his chin in one paw and very slowly blinked.

"Psst, Dad!" Kyle whispered loudly. "Tell the defense to begin his cross-examination." Eric was tapping his long claws on the pillow impatiently.

"Defense, you may begin your cross-examination," he muttered.

Eric perked up at once. "Yes, Your Honor!"

_Cross-Examination - I'm Totally Innocent!_

_I would never kill Mr. Stuffycheeks! He was my bestest friend ever!_

_At the time of the murder, I was upstairs, powdering my face!_

_**Hold it!** _

"Defendant, you were arrested at the scene and brought here without any time to clean up!" Eric said. "So where is this powder now?"

Delilah rolled her eyes. "Geez, Ricky, we're just pretending! Just  _imagine_ there's powder on my face!"

He flinched. "W-Well, you could've used talcum powder or something! No one told me!"

"Ew, I'm not putting that stuff on my face! I'd be coughing up a storm!"

"S-Sorry…"

_When I came down to check on Mr. Stuffycheeks, he was just laying there in the middle of the kitchen! Murdered!_

_**Hold it!** _

"Did you see anything suspicious aside from the body?" Eric asked.

"N-No... " she said, still shaking. "I was too shocked by the sight of the buh buh...buh buh...bodyyyyyyy!" She started crying in a painfully fake manner.

_**Objection!** _

"The defense is badgering the witness!" Kyle accused.

"I am not and that's offensive!"

_**Hold it!** _

That one was Simon. "I'm sorry...how long does this usually take?"

"About a couple hours," Kyle answered. "Longer if we go to investigation, but that part isn't as fun, so we usually skip it."

"Uh huh." Simon promptly got up. "Okay, court adjourned, we're done here."

He raised a paw to shush the oncoming slew of complaints. "Look, it's obvious Delilah did it anyway. Why else would she have left the scene of the crime to call the police when she was already inside the house? If the sight was too much for her, she could've just moved to another room. Clearly, she was just trying to escape."

"Eep!" Delilah collapsed to the floor, playing dead.

"Case closed. Now go to sleep."

Eric started crying.

"No, none of that!" Simon said sternly, making the badger clam up.

"Dad, come oooooon, can't you just have a little fun for once?" Kyle asked. "I mean, what do you even do these days besides hang out around the house, watch TV, and occasionally get dragged outside by Mom?"

 _The enemy has breached the defenses! Retreat, retreat!_ But Simon did not retreat. Kyle was right. He was a complete washout of the soldier he'd once been and there was nothing left for him to enjoy in life.

Nothing except his family.

And here he was, wasting away time that he could've been spending with his son. And those other two, but mostly his son.

After a moment of consideration, Simon sat back down on the bed. "Alright...back to the testimony then?"

Kyle and Eric were plainly stunned. Delilah was the opposite, spontaneously springing back up to life. "Nah, you're right, I totally did it! But there's still some other stuff we wanted to do tonight!" She listed them off on her bald fingers. "Pillow fighting, makeovers, stargazing…"

Simon scoffed. "I thought you said you wanted to have  _fun."_ He stood back up and walked out of the room, gesturing for them to follow.

Confused, the kits did as he asked as Simon led them out of Kyle's room and into his own shared bedroom with Karen. They stood outside the room, as if afraid to step one toe across the boundaries, while Simon walked up to the closet and opened it up. "Now  _this_ is fun."

"Whooooooa!" they chorused.

"Promise not to tell Karen about this?"

They all nodded obediently.

"Good." He pulled out an old-fashioned foam dart gun. "Then choose your weapon."

They didn't go to sleep for quite some time after that.

* * *

_10:00 PM_

"Banzaaaaaai!"

Soon enough, the kits were all running around the house, shooting foam darts at a variety of authentic military training targets Simon had set up. Kyle closed one eye and shot a target sitting in the window, then another inside the open oven in the kitchen, then another perched atop the TV, right between the antenna. None of those hits were bullseyes, but still impressive. "Excellent work, Kyle," Simon praised. "If this were the battlefield, I would fight beside you any day."

He beamed proudly. "Thanks, Dad!"

"Yes! Ten points!" Delilah announced, dancing atop the couch.

"My nose isn't a target!" Eric cried from the floor.

Simon wordlessly grabbed Kyle's gun from his paws and shot Delilah square in the back as she tried to retreat. "And if this were the battlefield,  _you_ would be court-marshaled. No friendly fire!"

* * *

_11:00 PM_

"Alright, soldiers, for your  _mostly_ respectable conduct tonight, I am awarding each of you a medal of valor." Simon leaned down and pinned a shiny medal to each of their lapels. They went nicely with the getup each of them had chosen for the occasion.

Kyle was suited up in his father's old Delta Fox uniform, which was way too big for him and completely impractical to actually fight in, but still adorable. He pushed the beret up over his eyes. "Thanks, Dad."

Eric was dressed as protectively as possible after the foam dart incident, in padded body armor and a large helmet. He looked less like a badger and more like a military-grade beach ball. He didn't even notice his medal until Simon poked him in his exposed neck. "Oh! Uh, thanks, Mr. VanDal."

Delilah spared no expense with full commando gear, actual (empty) weapons, and war paint splattered across her cheeks. "I am a goddess of death," she said, grinning wickedly. "But thank you."

"I am so glad you're not actually keeping these," Simon said, even more worried about today's youth than usual.

* * *

_12:00 AM_

"Dad, are you sure about this? What if Mom sees?"

"Then promise to remember me always, but it's worth it."

They were all the way up on the roof now. There may not have been a hot tub, but there  _was_ a very large box of fireworks, long-banned by any reasonable safety committee and covered in warning labels. "This is how Delta Fox  _really_ celebrates," he said, an intense smile slowly crossing his muzzle. "You think those games of yours have a lot of things blowing up? You ain't seen  _nothing_ yet!"

"Woooooo! Light 'em up!" Delilah encouraged.

"I can't watch!" Eric cowered inside of his armor.

"Oh yes you are!" Delilah forcefully reached inside and pulled his head back out.

Simon lit a match. "Care to count us off?"

"3!" Kyle yelled

"2!" Delilah joined in.

"...1!" Eric said hesitantly.

"Boom." Simon lit the fuse, watching it travel all the way over to the box of family-marketed explosives.

The resulting blast knocked all of them onto their backsides as the sky was bombarded by a barrage of fireworks, so bright that the initial volley was almost blinding. But once they did manage to open their eyes, they didn't close them again. "Oooooooooh! Aaaaaaaaaaah!"

Simon chuckled, for once just as entranced by the light show erupting above them. He wrapped an arm around Kyle's shoulder and pulled him closer, smiling down at his son. Kyle smiled back.

Yes...maybe he could get used to living again.

* * *

_1:00 AM_

"Honey...I'm home…" Karen yawned as she wearily opened the front door and stepped inside. Thank god for being nocturnal sometimes or she never would've made it through that presentation.

She wasn't surprised to see that no one was still up. The kits were probably asleep hours ago, and Simon hadn't pulled a late-nighter since the war. She dropped her purse ungracefully on the floor and lumbered upstairs, too tired to take notice of the house being immaculately, and suspiciously, clean. Knowing that Simon was most likely dead to the world himself, she opened the door to their shared bedroom quietly and stepped inside.

She was halfway into bed, fully-clothed, when she registered that he wasn't in there with her. "Dammit, Simon, if you're sleepdiving again, I'm just leaving you in the trash can this time."

Karen sniffed the air. No...Simon was nearby, and he didn't smell like garbage. At least, no more than usual. Deciding she might want to smack him for making her stay up even later, she followed her nose out of the room and over to the neighboring one. Raising an eyebrow, she slowly opened the door to Kyle's room.

It was there she found Simon, fast asleep on the floor. And there was no risk of him sleepdiving either, because there were three kits weighing him down.

By cuddling him.

And he was cuddling them too.

Karen smiled.  _That is precious._ She raised her phone and snapped a picture.  _And blackmail._

Content to leave them be, she closed the door and headed back to her own room, collapsing into bed.

Neither dreamt that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so we lied. Sorta. This isn't a direct continuation of Drabble 4, but we saw an opportunity to bring some closure to that little arc and we took it, even if it's a bit of a diluted version. Unlike Metal Gear itself, we decided that once was enough.
> 
> Consider this a sort of preview for "Badge & Delilah: Ace Attorneys", but if you've seen any of my previous forays into Ace Attorney stuff, it's probably not that jarring to you. Still doesn't mean it's going to happen next or anything. (And yes, this implies that our version of Zootopia runs on the same legal system as Ace Attorney. If this concerns you, it should.)
> 
> And the fable of "How the Raccoon Lost His Leg" still has no ending. But hey, at least now you know when it DIDN'T happen. :P.
> 
> Reina Quillivia belongs to me.


	9. One Pue Over the Cuckoo's Nest Nest Nest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now here's something new and different. Compared to the likes of Simon and Lucy, poor Harvey has gotten somewhat gypped in terms of character development. Being missing for an arc and a half will do that to you. So it's time to shed some light on him, and probably burn something down with it.

****

**Drabble 9: One Pue Over the Cuckoo's Nest Nest Nest**

_The Nocturnal District_

_Muskam Asylum_

_6: 14 PM_

_Our Patients May Stink, But Our Treatments Don't!_

It was a small miracle that the place hadn't been shut down as soon as they started using that slogan. The Muskam Mental Asylum had been built primarily to serve the needs of particularly "fragrant" species, whose tendency towards antisocial behavior and self-harm was significantly higher than average. The fact that it was stationed in the Nocturnal District, already a common source of mental disorders, only strengthened that need. Its goal was to help patients through their issues and help them reach self-acceptance, which was part of the rationale behind its controversial decision not to de-scent any of their patients, no matter how likely they were to abuse that. As a result, the place constantly reeked of musk and the gratuitous amounts of chemical cleaners used to mask it.

Dr. Sigmund Stripeveil had been the head doctor at the asylum for what felt like a lifetime and he still wasn't used to the smell. The elderly skunk hunched over his desk, clasping his long claws in front of him. He had a thick white beard and bushy eyebrows, through which he squinted at his latest visitor. "You are here to see Mr. Montapue? I must say, it's been a while since any specialist has tried their luck with him."

"Luck has never been a problem for me," the visiting specialist said, sitting up straight in his chair. Like him, he was dressed in a pristine white lab coat, but unlike him, and most of the mammals in this building, he was a fox. Who, granted, had some pretty well-developed scent glands of their own. "I've yet to meet a mammal I couldn't convince to see things my way. Well, outside of my ex, of course," he said with a chuckle.

"Of course." Stripeveil chuckled too, already finding common ground with the visitor, a "Dr. Jonothan Foxgood" as he called himself. "How familiar are you with the patient? He has quite a sordid history, you know."

"I do know," Foxgood confirmed. "At least, I know the rumors. He was the cause of a rather tremendous house fire around 11 years ago, am I right?"

He sighed. "You are. The poor kit was found at the very site, crying and blubbering uncontrollably about what he'd done. He's always had a pyromaniac streak, it seems, setting alight anything he thought amusing. With an attitude like that, it was only a matter of time before something like this happened."

"But it was an accident?" Foxgood pressed.

"Yes. From his ramblings, I gather that he thought the place was abandoned. It was such a powerful structure, it must have been too enticing of a target to resist."

"How did he get past the guards?"

Stripeveil raised one of those bushy eyebrows. "Excuse me?"

"Well, it must have been pretty heavily-guarded, right?" Foxgood asked. "So how did some pyro kit even pull it off?"

The old skunk pinched his brow. "We do not know. The manner in which he committed the crime is not relevant to us, only the results."

Foxgood nodded. "Right, right. I was just asking out of...professional curiosity."

Stripeveil was tempted to point out that the fox's behavior thus far had been somewhat lacking in professionalism, but he'd seen his credentials. A little eccentricity was often expected from this field. "I understand. Now, do keep in mind that this is all a closely-guarded secret. Most mammals have no idea who really caused that fire, and for Mr. Montapue's own protection, we aim to keep it that way."

The implied threat was clear. "Gotcha. But what about family? Doesn't he have anywhere else to go?"

Stripeveil hesitated for a moment. "Not anymore. The boy's family is no longer with us. He's been raised from kithood by a surrogate who turned him over to us after the incident. Even if she wanted us to release him back into her custody, he is still a criminal, you understand. It is not so simple of a matter."

"Issues of family never are," Foxgood admitted. "So when can I meet him?"

"Many have tried to help him over the years," Stripeveil cautioned. "Some with even more experience than yourself, Dr. Foxgood. I hope you don't expect this to be easy."

"When is this job ever easy?" he asked. "It's not about the difficulty of the task, Dr. Stripeveil. Helping our patients is its own reward."

Stripeveil smiled, for the first time seeing the makings of a true phycologist in him. "Well said."

* * *

_Intensive Care Ward_

_6: 20 PM_

Stripeveil led Foxgood out of his office and down the winding halls, through the cafeteria, and the rec center, before finally reaching the intensive care ward, placing his paw gently on the metal door that marked the entrance. "I warn you, some of the things you will see, and smell, will be troubling."

"I can handle it," Foxgood said, all too easily.

Stripeveil worried that he was perhaps underestimating what he was up against, but a little humility couldn't hurt him either. With a short nod, he pushed open the door and let them inside.

In an almost stereotypical fashion, this was both the darkest section of the building and the least welcoming. A long hallway stretched in front of them, lined with cells on each side. Stripeveil wondered sometimes if they would have less patients here with a better lighting budget. A stray bulb flickered a few times as if to support his theory.

"Bit of a  _Shedder Island_ vibe you've got going on here," Foxgood pointed out.

"Yes, yes, I know. Follow closely."

And he did, which became necessary as they passed by the cells of several other patients who might otherwise prove...distracting.

There was the skinny Ferris Wheeler, a scraggly ferret whose own persistent stench had driven him insane in his efforts to rid himself of it. Both his arms and legs had to be securely fastened to keep him from attempting to "scrub himself clean", an action that had previously resulted in a much dirtier cell and a less whole ferret. Even multiple baths a day from the orderlies never satisfied him for long, and he could just see the ferret through his tiny window now, flopping around on the ground and muttering incessantly. "Too stinky, too stinky, need a bath, need a bath!"

On the other end of the spectrum was Mindy Smellerton, a polecat who had gone mad with power after spraying her bullies into submission, then continuing to abuse it on anyone who gave her even the most minor of slights. She was one of the chief arguments used by those in favor of de-scenting patients, and needed to be doused in what felt like several tons of Fleabreeze just to overpower her stench and keep her somewhat stable. Somewhat. "Not stinky enough, not stinky enough, no baths, no baths!"

Foxgood looked at both of them with a discomforting amount of interest.

Finally, they reached their destination, looking through the window at one Harvard Francis Montapue. The skunk's padded cell was covered in bite and claw marks, some in impressively hard to reach locations. Harvey himself was lying in a fetal position, twitching inside of his straightjacket and muttering, his own words unintelligible. "He seems fun," Foxgood observed.

Stripeveil knocked gently on the door. "Mr. Montapue? Can you hear me? You have a new visitor."

"Hmm?" The skunk shot up into a sitting position with surprisingly little effort. "Hello hello hello! It's good to meet meet meet you!"

"We don't understand the repeating thing either," Stripeveil said softly. "The best we can come up with is that the speech center of his brain was stunted from the trauma, making him get 'stuck' every few words until he can properly process his thoughts."

" _Or_  it's just an endearing character trait," Foxgood replied, looking closer. "Is that a tame collar? I noticed them on the other patients as well."

"Indeed. Ghastly devices, I'm sure you know, but sometimes necessary for intensive treatments such as this, to keep him from getting too overstimulated."

"Oh yes, I like like like my collar!" Harvey exclaimed, hopping up and down excitedly. "It really helps me out out out when I need it! I'm so happy to be here! So so so hap-EEEE!" He froze as a shock rippled through his body and Harvey collapsed to the floor.

He was back up again and bouncing two seconds later. "Hi, my name is Harvey! How are you you yo-OOOO!" He was shocked again and fell back to the floor.

"It hasn't exactly worked as intended..." Stripeveil confessed. "But we're afraid to see what he's like without  _any_ restraint."

"Very fun at parties, I imagine." Again, Foxgood looked at the skunk with the kind of interest that Stripeveil wasn't entirely sure belonged in this environment. "I would like to request some one-on-one time with him."

He nodded. "Alright, you may go inside. I will be monitoring your session from here, of course."

"I think you misunderstood me." He chuckled softly. "One-on-one means  _one-on-one._ I don't like being watched."

The skunk's brow furrowed. "If you think I'm leaving you in there alone-"

"What are you going to do about it?" Foxgood asked, suddenly radiating a malice that made Stripeveil's tail raise a little. "Have me kicked out? Try it, and you'll be following right behind me after I report all the health code violations I spotted on the way here."

"What are you talking about?"

The fox raised a paw, ticking off points on his clawed fingers. "Your cafeteria is infested with cockroaches, your rec room has exposed nails, your cleaning products create a choking hazard, and while tame collars  _are_ standard use for intensive care treatments, you still require a permit for each individual case."

"We  _have_ permits!" Stripeveil protested, so flabbergasted by this sudden turn of events that he didn't know what else to say.

"Even for him?" Foxgood asked, pointing a thumb at the confined skunk who was currently running into a wall repeatedly, oblivious to this entire exchange. "I doubt it. Not if you really  _are_  trying to keep his presence here a secret."

Stripeveil's tail stood straight up as he glared at the visitor. "You're not even a real doctor, are you?"

"No, but I  _do_ know a thing or two about psychology. For example, I know that you are very tempted to spray me right now, but you won't, because that would go against everything your practice allegedly stands for." He flicked him the forehead. "So why don't you just let me talk to the patient...okay?"

* * *

_Harvey's Cell_

_6: 28 PM_

Count Reynard stepped inside the cell, taking the time to close the window looking in and smirk at the fuming doctor left behind, then sat himself down in front of the pyro. Harvey had stopped running into walls by now and had found a nice, tight corner to settle into, facing away from him. "Mr. Montapue...Harvey? Would you care to chat with me?"

He did not respond, and not even a fox was crazy enough to risk startling a skunk, so Reynard waited patiently until he turned around and spotted him again. "Oh! When did you get get get here?"

"I am here to help you, Harvey," Reynard claimed, curious if manipulating the insane was going to be easier or harder than he was used to. "Why don't you tell me about the incident 11 years ago?"

His collar flickered to yellow immediately and he tried to back away, despite the fact that he was already against the wall. "No no no! I can't talk talk talk about that that that! I might might might hurt you too too too!"

"How would just telling me something hurt me?" Reynard asked curiously.

Harvey clutched his head and started rocking back and forth on his heels. "Becaus can't can't can't control myself! I get get get too worked worked worked up up up!"

Between Harvey's refusal to open up and the increase in his verbal hitch, it was clear that this was the source of his issues, and also what had kept the doctors here from getting through to him for 11 years. He had completely sealed himself off from the outside world, and had likely been this way for most of his life now. None of these quacks had a chance of breaking through the mental barriers he'd erected around himself.

But Reynard had something that those doctors didn't, and lacked something that they did. In order, experience and morals. "I understand how you feel, Harvey. I've hurt a lot of mammals too."

Harvey stopped rocking, teary eyes staring up at him with cautious disbelief. "You you you have?"

"Yes," Reynard said honestly. "And like you, it all started with a fire. A fire that was responsible for shaping me into the mammal I am today." He looked down at the sterile floor. "I can still hear the screams in my head, and smell the smoke around me. It brings all of those memories rushing back, and I remember now exactly how I felt then."

" _Ahahahahahahaha!" Reynard laughed maniacally, the heat of the blaze washing over him as the all-consuming flames of vengeance roared to life. "Aaaaaaahahahahahahaha!"_

"The guilt is overwhelming. Sometimes, I wonder if I can ever be forgiven for the lives I ended that day." He shuddered. "Oh, and this wasn't  _your_ fire, by the way. Completely different fire."

Harvey looked confused. "Why would it be  _my_  fire?"

"Just a disclaimer. I know  _someone_ was thinking it."

Harvey shook off the confusion quickly, hopping a few paces closer to him. "So you you you really understand me me me?"

"Yes…" he said, adding in a remorseful sigh. "I'm not even a real doctor. I just...wanted the chance to talk with someone else like me. Who's been through the same kind of trauma." He sniffled. "I'm sorry I wasted your time."

The skunk frowned in sympathy, awkwardly leaning into his shoulder. "There there there. It's okay."

"I g-guess," he cried. "T-Thank y-you."

"And you even talk talk talk funny too!" He grinned. "We really are are are alike!"

Reynard nodded, allowing himself a small smile. "Do...do you think you can talk about what happened? Please. Maybe it can help me too."

Harvey bit his lip nervously. "Are are are you sure sure sure?"

He nodded faster, starting to tear up again.

"Alright…" The skunk took a few, wheezing breaths, and began to speak. "I don't don't don't remember exactly what happened anymore. It was a long long long time ago and everything is all all all fuzzy." If Reynard weren't insane already, this skunk's speech patterns would get him there fast. "I remember sneaking inside. It looked empty. I wasn't careful careful careful enough...thought no one would be be be around…"

He started to shake again. "But I was wrong wrong wrong! Stupid stupid stupid! Foolish foolish foolish! They were there! All of them were there! I killed them all all all!"

"All all all?"

"All all all!" Now Harvey was the one crying and Reynard was providing comfort. Just as planned. "Those poor poor poor little batties! They didn't deserve that that that!"

"Well, their dad kinda did," Reynard admitted. "He  _was_ a crime lord, you know."  _And my only regret is not getting to off the crappy flappy myself._

That did nothing to stop the skunk's sobbing. He was getting dangerously close to being zapped again.

"Okay, sorry, I didn't mean it like that!"  _Yes I did._ "I'm only saying that, even though it was a tragic accident, you accomplished something good in doing it. You eliminated one of Zootopia's most powerful crime families down to the root and the Nocturnal District is a better place because of it."  _A lot worse actually, but I bet your sheltered self doesn't know that._

He finally stopped crying for a second. "R-Really?"

He smiled. "Really. You're a hero, Harvey."

"But but but the pups-!"

"Would've grown up just as monstrous as the big bloodsucker himself. There were no innocents in that castle." He paused for a minute and let the skunk calm himself down a bit more before he cast his line. "So how did you do it?"

"Huh?" Harvey asked, confused. Confused, not crying or angry, which was a good start.

"One does not simply burn down Castle Fangpyre," he said, smiling disarmingly. "It must have taken a lot of skill and expertise to pull it off, especially for a seven-year-old at the time. Yes, I can do math too. You're eighteen, right?"

Harvey nodded hesitantly. "Yeah. I have a lot lot lot of experience sneaking away from Big Sis. I'm good good good at getting into places I'm I'm I'm not supposed to be. Big Sis doesn't like it when I burn burn burn things, so I had to get creative. Made little bombs bombs bombs that go boom boom boom. Lots of fire."

"Fascinating," Reynard mused, more interested in this troubled teen and his pyrotechnic skills than ever. "I could use someone like you around. Your skills would be most helpful."

"No!" he said instantly. "No no no! I won't won't won't hurt anyone else else else! Even if they  _are_ bad bad bad!"

"Who said anything about hurting anyone?" he asked. "What if there was a way to ensure that you could burn anything you wanted without ever having to worry about endangering anyone?"

The skunk clearly did not believe such a thing was possible. "What what what do you mean?"

And it was probably wasn't, but Reynard could at least make it sound like it was. "Well...you've been able to put your fire into bombs, right? What if you were to do the same with your skunk spray? There's not a mammal on Earth who can stand being in the same room as that stuff, so just toss enough around and they'll come running right out, leaving the place nice and empty for you to light up." Assuming they didn't instead become incapaciated, or pass out, or somehow  _like_  the smell. This was one of the advantages of making deals with the insane and immature.

It was also one of the reasons he needed to get Dr. Stripeveil off his back for this. To say that he would not approve of this idea would be an understatement.

Harvey sure seemed to be considering it though. The idea of being able to freely indulge in his pyromania without fear of consequence was undoubtedly appealing to him. "I...I don't know know know. I've been here so so so long, I'm not sure sure sure if I could just leave."

"Haven't you always wanted to see what the surface world is like?" Reynard asked. "The lush canopies of the Rainforest District, the shimmering glaciers of Tundratown, the festive decorations of Sahara Square..." He still looked unsure. "And you can set fire to all of it."

"Ooooooooooh!" he purred excitedly. "Okay okay okay! You got yourself a deal deal deal!" Lacking any free paws, Harvey extended a scraggly-clawed foot to shake instead.

Reynard grimaced a little, but shook it anyway. "Welcome to the team, Sparky."

* * *

_Intensive Care Ward_

_6: 46 PM_

Reynard and his plucky new companion emerged from the cell, facing the mammal who had been waiting for them outside.

It was a grinning bat in a black bodysuit. "Heya, boss. That our new friend?"

"He sure is. Why don't you introduce yourself, Firecracker?"

The skunk bounced towards her, too excited to keep still. "Hi, I'm HarvAAAGH!" In record time, he managed to set off his collar.

"Hold on, I've got ya," Lucy said, swooping behind the skunk and using a tiny knife to cut through the bindings on his straightjacket. Between his twitching and his smell, he didn't exactly make it easy. "Hey, hold still! You want me to put  _more_ holes in your fur?" Finally, she managed to get the jacket off, now inching towards the tame collar on his neck.

"Wait wait wait!" he yelled just as Lucy was about to cut into it. "I want to keep keep keep that!"

Lucy was stunned. "You  _want_ to wear a tame collar?"

"I told you he'd be weird," Reynard said with a shrug. "Fits right in with the rest of our merry little band, eh?"

"Yep yep yep!" Harvey cheered, proving himself colorblind to red when displayed on a flag-like shape. "You two are my new best best best friends ever! Wooooo!"

The ecstatic skunk took off skipping down the hall towards freedom. A few steps there, he zapped himself, yelped, and fell on his face. Then he got back up, skipped a few steps, zapped himself, yelped, and fell on his face. Then he got back up, skipped a few steps, zapped himself, yelped, and fell on his face. Then he got back up, skipped a few steps, zapped himself, yelped, and fell on his face.

Reynard and Lucy watched with morbid fascination as this repeated several more times. "Are you sure about this one?" the bat had to ask.

"At least 50...40% sure."

"You never even told me what he actually  _did."_

"Burn stuff."

"Ah. Relatable."

"Indeed."

Then he got back up, skipped a few steps, zapped himself, yelped, and fell on his face.

"Say it."

Lucy looked up at him. "Say what?"

"We're standing in the middle of an insane asylum and I just freed an actual psycho. What's one word that could describe this situation?" He looked at her expectantly, mouth partially open as he waited for her to heed the call of destiny.

She sighed. "Crazy."

"Crazy like us all, Lucy Goosey. Crazy like us all."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As someone who has personally thought of way too much regarding Zootopian skunk culture, this chapter was a bit of an excuse to expel some of it. Seriously, PM me about this sometime if you want me to just regale you. You can't tell me that animals with highly-developed scent glands aren't going to have some "issues" about it. Do keep in mind though that this IS the intensive care part of the facility. The run-of-the-mill patients are more along the lines of, "I smell bad and that's a problem. Please help me deal."
> 
> (And if you're aware of Steven Stinkman's backstory, all I can say is OOF.)
> 
> A lot revealed about Harvey in this one, though in usual fashion, not quite everything of import. You can probably make some inferences about more of his past though. And hey, it looks like all three of Reynard's original lieutenants have killed a crime lord now. At least Harv got to be included. :P
> 
> Dr. Sigmund Stripeveil and everything else dealing with Muskam Asylum belongs to me.


	10. Castlemania: Lords of Shallow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And one more drabble for the road! Yes, we will actually be getting back to the story after this, I swear. (This is what happens when you wait too long to start taking your drabble collection seriously.)
> 
> I doubt you guys will complain about this one though.

**Drabble 10: Castlemania: Lords of Shallow**

_The Nocturnal District_

_Castle Fangpyre_

_20 Years Ago_

"Are we all assembled?"

"There's only six of us, Big. You can count."

"Do not insult Mr. Big's mathematical ability."

"It's quite alright, Koslov. We must make a good impression for our newest member."

"And I appreciate the sentiment. Thank you all for this warm welcome."

"Still can't believe you made me come all the way down here for this."

"Quiet, Preston. You spend too much time on your remote little island as is."

"Says the so-called 'lady' who no one can even find half the time."

"Miss Lang is a very busy mammal."

"Stand down, Felix."

"Yes, Miss Lang."

"So can we get this show on the road or what? I'm getting jumpy!"

"WAAAAAAAH!"

"Now look at what you've done! Hush now, niño. It's alright."

There were two clicks and a buzz.

"Mr. Narwhalter agrees with the sentiment of starting this meeting posthaste, intoned in such a way as to imply general displeasure towards being in the same room as any of you."

"He's  _not_ in the same room!"

"WAAAAAAAH!"

"You are upsetting my son!"

"Why did you even bring that little brat here?!"

"Everyone, please! This is a time of celebration! Russ, Sprock, dim the lights and let's get started."

"Yes, boss."

"No no, that's  _too_ dim! We have guests from the surface here! Light some candles, make it appropriately foreboding."

"Yes, boss."

"Excellent." The finely-dressed bat looked around appreciatively at the meeting hall.

The room itself was fairly plain, with only a large violet carpet stretched across the floor and a sizable round table set up in the middle, surrounded by a ring of chairs. On the far wall, a colorful display of purple and black stained-glass windows more than made up for the dreariness, while the aforementioned candles helped to set the atmosphere, as much as the room's occupants threatened to destroy it. And what a colorful bunch they were.

There was Mr. Big, the crime lord of Tundratown. The diminutive arctic shrew sat in a chair in the outstretched paw of his eternally faithful bodyguard, Koslov. Neither were an appropriate size for the actual chair that had been prepared for them, which Koslov's girth aimed to collapse any second. Nevertheless, both of them looked very comfortable to be there, the former being one of the oldest attendees and the latter rarely showing his displeasure for anything.

Across from them sat Preston Thornbrush, the crime lord of Outback Island. He was an elderly koala, and the cantankerous sort of elderly at that, dressed in a spiffy black suit with fur several shades greyer than normal. He was actively smoking a cigar of eucalyptus, as if his personality weren't toxic enough, and blowing the fumes distastefully into the air. Behind him stood his own bodyguard, a suited hippo known as Tractor. He spoke softly and carried a big pipe.

To their right was Annamarie Luna, more commonly known as Lady Lang, crime lord of the Rainforest District. Dressed in a dark blue blazer and high heels, the whiter wolf clasped her painted claws in front of her, tail softly flicking as she patiently waited for the proceedings to begin. The other crime lords could only assume that she chose not to bring a bodyguard, as the only mammal with her was a wolf pup in a dark blue shirt and black pants. He was a bit tall for his age and looked way more serious than any child should, but was otherwise unimpressive.

Across from  _them_ sat Sandcat Serena, the crime lord of Sahara Square. The feline wore a very festive and colorful dress, lined with glitter and jewels like she had just come here from Meowdi Gras. She completed the look with the upper half of a sun mask that concealed her eyes. It was actually somewhat intimidating, especially with the presence of her bodyguard, the young matador, Gomez. Less so because she had brought her infant son as well and he was a bit of a crybaby.

Right of them was a seat without a guest, and then a guest without a seat. Piers Narwhalter, crime lord of the Docks, never attended these meetings in person, which was nigh-impossible for multiple reasons. Instead, a large monitor had been set up for him to video conference from. Even then, the reclusive marine mammal didn't show his own face. He communicated through his native tongue somewhere in the background while his interpreter, the bespectacled Dolphonics, took front and center.

The last seat was taken by the newly-appointed crime lord of the Nocturnal District, who also happened to be their host, Vladzotz Fangypre III. The bat wore a white undershirt beneath a black vest and black overcoat with a vampiric collar and tail, all sleeveless to allow room for his wings to stretch. He also sported a red bow tie in the shape of a pair of outstretched bat wings. Accompanying him on his left was Russ, a quiet, bulky badger in an equally bulky black suit and tie with a red trim. On his right was Sprock, a wry and wiry raccoon in a black vest and red trench coat. His fur was a mess and his teeth were dirty, but he was smiling anyway. "So...we all just gonna stare at each other or…?"

Vlad cleared his throat. "Right. As I was saying, I thank you all for welcoming me into the fold with this conference of the Zootopian crime lords. I may not have been a part of this for very long, but if I didn't know any better, I'd almost feel as if my inclusion were planned from the very beginning. Almost." He lifted a wine glass off the table in front of him. "A toast to organized crime." He brought it to his lips, the other crime lords joining him in downing the red liquid. Except Narwhalter.

Sprock suddenly spoke up again. "Oh wait, is  _this_ where you're sitting, boss? I probably should've asked about that before setting the drinks."

Every other crime lord did an immediate spit-take. Except Narwhalter.

The raccoon laughed. "Kidding! That one never gets old!"

"Shut up, you idiot," Russ growled, about the only thing he said regularly.

The other crime lords were unamused. Even Narwhalter. "Mr. Narwhalter does not appreciate your attempt to poison him."

"But it's not...he's not even...what?"

"Very amusing," Vlad said dryly. "For the sake of your joke, I hope you don't mind cleaning up the mess you made."

The raccoon muttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'worth it' as he set to work wiping up the spilled wine with a rag.

"In the meantime, why don't the rest of you fill me in on your own activities?" Vlad suggested. "My father has given me an idea of what each of you do, but I would prefer to hear it straight from the source."

"Sounds reasonable," Preston said, rolling his cigar around in his mouth. "So who's going first?"

"I feel somewhat obligated to," Mr. Big replied. "I am a mogul of transportation. I get mammals and goods where they need to go, make sure everything is in order and that all debts are paid. Otherwise, mammals don't like where they go so much." Most of the attendees chuckled, as if sharing in a particularly dark inside joke. "For you, Vladzotz, I would be happy to give a ride should you ever feel inclined to visit."

"Thank you for the offer, but I would prefer to stay down here for the foreseeable future," Vlad said bluntly, but politely.

"Saw that one coming," said Lang. "His father was the same way. I don't know why you even bothered to ask."

"Professional courtesy."

"Fair enough." The wolfess tilted her head very slightly to address Vlad. "I suppose I will go next then. As Preston said, you likely won't see very much of me, but I run a large extortion racket in the Rainforest District. I own several businesses there, because their original owners know better than to incite the wrath of my pack."

"Meaning she sics her pups on them if they don't pay up," Preston said shortly.

"I suppose that's one way of putting it," she admitted. "But my  _pups,_ as you refer to them, are far more than mere hired muscle. They are my family."

"What about him?" Vlad asked curiously, gesturing to the young wolf standing at her side. "He does appear to be more family than muscle."

She smiled softly. "Appearances can be deceiving. Felix here is training to be my personal bodyguard one day. I thought this experience would be beneficial."

Preston snorted. "You're joking."

"Felix, a demonstration, please?"

"Yes, Miss Lang."

Tractor suddenly let out a yell and dropped to one knee. The entire assembly watched as Felix leapt right into the center of the table, scaring the crap out of Sprock, then surged over Preston's head and kicked his bodyguard under the chin, successfully tipping the hippo off-balance and knocking him onto his back. "A simple matter of physics," the wolf pup explained, hopping back down to Lang's side. "I believe the saying goes, 'the bigger they are, the harder they fall.'"

"Alright, you made your point, Lang," Preston growled. "Tractor, get up. You're a disgrace."

"Yes, sir." The hippo glared at Felix as he stood back up, but the wolf didn't even look back.

Vlad clapped lightly. "Very impressive. If I may ask, from whom did the boy learn such skills?"

"From his mother," Lang replied simply, and just a tiny bit smugly.

"She did not  _always_  wear high heels," Serena added, smiling from beneath her mask. "And you do not want her to take them off."

"Duly noted."

"This reminds me...Mr. Big?" Lang tilted her head very slightly again back at the shrew. "I believe you told me earlier that you were interested in making me a business proposal."

"I did indeed," he affirmed. "My influx of new vehicles has increased greatly as of late. While this is good for business, I am lacking in mechanical assistance to keep them all up and running. I would like to hire the services of some of your children for maintenance, and in exchange, I shall provide more funding for those 'derbies' they enjoy so much."

"A little  _too_ much," Lang replied. "But my children do like them and they are surprisingly expensive affairs, so color me interested. Let's discuss this aside, shall we?"

"Let's." Big, well  _Koslov,_ got up and followed Lang and Felix away from the table to continue discussing their deal. Even if this was a meeting of cooperation, the crime lords weren't privy to sharing everything with everyone and so no one batted an eye.

"I shall go next," Serena said. "Only because I don't think Preston has calmed himself yet."

"Bugger off."

"I am in charge of Zootopia's largest gambling ring, and owner of the Oasis Casino in the Grand Palms Hotel." Serena let out a coy giggle. "Well, I own pretty much the entire hotel actually, but not publically. Do you enjoy games, Vladzotz?"

"I'm afraid I don't have much time to indulge," the bat said. "On games, that is."

"What about music?"

_That_  got his attention, his large ears perking up. "What kind of music?"

"Flamenco, mariachi, classical guitar…"

"Oh." His ears lowered. "That is not exactly my genre."

She smirked. "I figured, but I had to ask. It wouldn't hurt to broaden your horizons a bit though. You are one of us now. A whole new world of possibilities is open to you."

"You may have a point," Vlad conceded. "I'll consider it. But only at night, and only if you can ensure I won't be mobbed by curious surface-dwellers."

"Agreed," she said, tipping her mask to him. He caught a brief glimpse of beautiful gold eyes before she refastened it. "You see? Your first night as a crime lord and already you are making deals."

"It appears so!" he laughed.

"WAAAAAAAH!"

"Oh no, not again!" Serena looked down at the bundled kitten in her arms. "I knew this was not a good place to bring him."

"You  _think?!"_ Preston asked.

She ignored him, turning to her bodyguard instead. "Gomez, help me out here."

"Si, jefe." The bull pulled out a pair of maracas while Serena softly began to sing.

" _My little onnnnnnnne, please do not cryyyyyyyy."_

" _Think of the staaaaaars, up in the skyyyyyyyyy."_

" _They shine so briiiiiiiiiight, they shine so loooooooong."_

" _Now say goodniiiiiiiight, when I end this soooooooong."_

The kitten yawned, his beady eyes slowly falling shut. The rest of the room was silent as well, even Preston, mesmerized by her enchanting voice. "That was incredible," Vlad finally said, quietly.

"Gracias. I apologize for the commotion. Little Sanchez has some powerful vocal cords, just like his mother."

"I dearly hope that he grows up to sing just like his mother as well."

"Because right now, he's pretty offensive to the ears," Preston said, not mesmerized for long.

She hissed at him. "Your turn."

"If you insist." The koala finally put out his cigar, in what was left of his drink. "I'm a drug runner. Name something that's big, hot, and spreading like wildfire, and I'm probably controlling it."

"Blood."

Preston froze, whatever spiel he had prepared dying in his throat. Slowly, he looked down at his drink, clearly wishing he could have that last sip after all. "I...I don't...control that...no…"

"You shut him up," said a stunned Lady Lang, returning to her seat. "No one has  _ever_ shut him up before."

"An impressive feat," Mr. Big agreed as Koslov sat them back down. Against all odds, the chair endured.

"I couldn't resist," Vlad said, smiling devilishly at the still-horrified koala. Having finished with the table, Sprock snickered as well. "It is the nature of the job to know how to silence those who talk too much."

Preston didn't respond even to that.

"But speaking of silence…" Vlad turned to the only other crime lord yet to introduce themselves, "Mr. Narwhalter has not chimed in for quite some time now."

A long stream of buzzes and whistles came from behind Dolphonics. "Mr. Narwhalter prefers to listen rather than speak, said derisively," his translator clarified. "He is an information broker, skilled in gathering intelligence from all corners of Zootopia, and using it towards whatever means he sees fit."

"That includes information on all of us, I assume?"

"But of course." Dolphonics pushed up the rim of his glasses and smirked. "Lord Vladzotz Canomir Fangpyre III, born and raised in the Nocturnal District beneath two stern, conservative parents who instilled those very same traits within you. In particular, your father, Vladzotz II, raised you to be heir to the Nocturnal Mob, teaching you about business, finances, the underworld, and anything else he deemed useful to run a large and successful criminal empire. He also taught you how to play the organ, which you now do regularly on most nights. When you were younger, you often asked to accompany your father on business trips to the surface world, even though you both despise it and want to see it burn for the neglect it has shown to your species and the Nocturnal District as a whole. You grew up exclusively drinking blood and have generally lived an elusive, some might even say sheltered, life before your father died and you took control of the Nocturnal Mob, which has brought us to this very meeting. Shall I continue?"

Even Vlad was visibly unnerved now. "How did you learn all of that?"

"It wasn't easy, not even for Mr. Narwhalter. You hide your secrets well, Vladzotz. But not well  _enough."_

"Your borderline-stalkerish tendencies have been noted, Piers," said Lang, shifting a bit uncomfortably herself.

"Mr. Narwhalter learns whatever he can,  _when_ ever he can," Dolphonics justified. "It is why he will be the only one left when the end comes." A sharp series of clicks cut him off. "Mr. Narwhalter would have preferred I not said that, and asks you to strike the previous statement from memory."

"We'll get right on that," Serena replied dryly.

"It should be noted that Piers is also somewhat of a conspiracy theorist," said Mr. Big. "Before we proceed, we should probably ask if there is anything of the sort he wishes to discuss."

"Best to get it over with," Lang agreed.

An excited buzz answered them. "As a matter of fact, there  _are_ some topics Mr. Narwhalter wishes to bring up," Dolphonics said. "Among them are surveillance probes hidden with Bug Burga's napkins, subliminal messages in Jerry Vole music, brainwashed foreign spies disguised as migrant workers, and of course, the Marine Cannibalism Agenda…"

"Oh my, we appear to be falling behind schedule!" Serena said loudly, shuffling through a stack of papers that hadn't even been there a moment earlier. "We'll have to move on for now and get back to that. Uh...I believe we were going to hear a favor today?"

Someone cleared their throat. "Yes, yes you were. If that's okay with you…?"

All six crime lords and their bodyguards turned their heads to the entrance of the room, where there was suddenly another mammal standing. "How long has he been there?" Mr. Big whispered to Serena, who shrugged in response.

"Not our fault," Koslov said. "Scrawny fox lacks presence."

"Um...yes, I suppose compared to you all, I would." Said scrawny fox shuffled up to the table, smiling nervously. He wore a black suit, one that had been worn for quite some time as evidenced by the scuff marks and slight tears. His fur was mostly well-groomed, but off in just a few spots. And he smelled just a bit too heavily of cologne. It all gave the impression of someone who had tried their best to look good for this meeting, but didn't have much to work with. "Greetings, everyone. My name is John Wilde. A few of you have met me already."

"Ah, Johnny! Good to see ya!" Preston greeted warmly, having finally snapped out of his stupor. "This suit is your finest work yet!" He showed off his attire proudly.

"Thank you," he said bashfully. "Suitopia appreciates your business."

"And my funding," he added, winking.

"Yes, that too."

"You can discuss business later," Mr. Big cut in, somewhat amused as it was normally Preston himself who didn't want to waste time. "We wish to hear your favor now, Mr. Wilde."

"R-Right." He took a deep breath. "The thing is, I've been in a bit of a rough spot lately, having just been kicked out of the house by my wife, and right now I'm living in this run-down shack in Rainforest..."

"My sympathies," Serena said genuinely.

"Are you looking for a loan?" asked Lang, her ears perking up at the mention of her territory.

"No, this isn't about me," John insisted. "I can manage on my own. I have for many years. This is for the sake of my son, Nicholas Wilde. Having to leave him was awful enough, but now I've found out that he's run away from home. The boy is only twelve! He can't survive like I have!"

"The solution seems fairly clear-cut to me," Vlad said, somewhat confused. "Could you not just take care of him yourself?"

"I wish I could, but I don't even know where he is right now." John sighed. "And even if I did find him, I don't have the ability to look after him any more. I've lost everything in one night."

"Are you  _sure_ you don't want a loan?" Lang asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes. Marian made it quite clear that she doesn't want me around my own son anymore. I'm going to be leaving this city for good soon, and I don't know if I'll ever be coming back, but...I can't just leave without knowing that my son is safe." He looked up at them, his eyes focused and determined. "That's why I've come to you today. I humbly request that one of you find my son and take him under your care, molding him into someone that can survive out in the real world."

The weight of his request crashed down on the assembled lords, leaving them stunned into silence. Slowly, they started to exchange glances, as if to say, " _You_  didn't see this coming, did you?"

Shortly after that, he got the first response. "Mr. Narwhalter rejects your favor."

"No surprise there," John said without considering his surroundings. Luckily for him, he knew that most of them had a decent sense of humor and his comment actually got a few chuckles.

But then came the next response. "I'm afraid I can't do that, Johnny," said Preston. He actually sounded a bit apologetic, but only a bit. "I'm grateful to you and your business, really I am, but it's hard enough keeping track of a bunch of drug addicts without having to worry about some little fox brat getting into the stash." He didn't bother adding a "No offense". "Besides...this little development means that Suitopia is out of business, doesn't it?"

John shifted nervously. "W-Well...yes."

"I see." He gestured to Tractor to light him another cigar, just so he could put it out into the glass again. "I gave you a very sizable loan to get that establishment up and running, you know. For the most part, you've paid it back in full." He gestured to the suit he was wearing. "But not entirely. So tell you what, in lieu of watching your brat, I'll reward your good service by letting you walk out on me with your legs intact. Deal?"

What else could he say? "Deal…" This wasn't good. Preston Thornbrush had been his best bet coming in, and now he was firmly off the table. Even as a pro gambler, this wasn't a game of risk he wanted to play with him. "Um...anyone else? I've taught Nicholas as much as I could. I promise he won't be a burden."

"Be that as it may, he is still just a child," Mr. Big replied. "I fear the cold of Tundratown may prove miserable for a fox kit. Not to mention that the services I provide are generally geared towards larger mammals." He gestured to Koslov, who nodded in agreement.

Another wisecrack instantly came to John's mind, but this one he knew better than to say aloud.

"I must raise similar concerns," Vlad stated. "The Nocturnal Mob has never been shy about indoctrinating young minds under our cause, but we are not a nightcare-"

"Daycare," Sprock corrected.

"Daycare center. I do not know your child. I am wary of investing effort into his nurturing."

"Of course," John allowed. "But if you just give him a chance, I'm sure you will see the boy's potential."

"You do understand what that means, yes? He would not have an ordinary kithood. The Nocturnal Mob would put him to work doing tasks both dangerous and destructive. Under my employ, he would also be required to make a…" Vlad paused, licking his fangs, "...weekly contribution, for the sake of his employer." Russ and Sprock tilted their heads back, showing puncture marks on their necks. "Is that what you want for your son?" Vlad asked.

The thought made John shudder involuntarily, which was all the answer the bat lord needed. "I thought as much."

"N-No, wait! It could work! I didn't mean to-!"

"I can  _tell_ what you meant," he said sharply. "My answer is no."

"As is mine," Mr. Big confirmed.

John was starting to panic now. Six crime lords to choose from, and he'd already been rejected by more than half.

"Maybe  _I_  could do it."

The fox looked up with surprise as one of the female crime lords volunteered, and not the one he would have expected. "Serena? You would be willing?" he asked hopefully.

"Of course. I already have plenty of experience raising a little niño. I don't see why I can't look after one more, especially with the help of my underlings," she answered with a friendly smile. "I've always wanted to help further relations between cats and dogs anyhow."

"Excellent! I-!"

*SNAP*

Without warning, Koslov's chair finally buckled beneath him, sending both bear and boss to the floor.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Serena gasped. "This is worse than before! Gomez! We must calm him!"

The bull hurriedly pulled out his maracas as Serena sang to him again.

" _My little onnnnnnne, it's just a chaaaaaaair!"_

" _There is no neeeeeed, for you to caaaaaaaare!"_

He cared. "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" The sounds of his cry started to shake the entire room, making everyone inside desperately shield their ears.

"It isn't enough this time!" Serena yelled. "We must assemble the entire band for this! Quickly! Before it's too late!"

"H-Hey! What about-?"

Before John could even finish his sentence, Serena and Gomez rushed past him and out of the chamber. Sanchez's wailing echoed from the distance for some time after. "Don't think she'll be back tonight," Preston noted. "Not to say I told her so, but…"

John swallowed. Just like that, he only had one option left. "Lady Lang…?"

"Be quiet."

John flinched, caught off-guard by the sheer  _coldness_ in her tone. "What? But I thought you of all mammals would-"

"I said  _be quiet,"_ she snapped. Lady Lang was his best option next to Preston, or so he thought. Right now, she was glaring at him with uncharacteristic intensity. "While it is true that I formed the Lang Family to take in lost pups without a home, and I am not above doing so for pups of another species, the fact of the matter is, young Nicholas  _isn't_ a pup without a home, is he?"

"W-Well, technically speaking-"

"He  _has_ a mother. You just don't want him to go back to her." She leaned in towards him. "Now why is that? Is she sick?"

"No."

"Disabled?"

"No."

"In any way incapable of raising a child?"

" _Physically_ no," he admitted. "But Marian doesn't understand what a fox kit needs to survive in this world. I fear what could become of my boy if he isn't properly educated on the matter. Like I said, I would do that myself, but-"

Lang raised a paw to stop him. She was treating him coldly before, but now she was shaking with barely-contained fury. "So let me get this straight. You are so self-assured that your way is the only way for a fox to live that you would rather entrust your son's livelihood to a criminal you barely know than to return him to the love and protection of his own mother who is likely worried sick about him?"

"Uh...when you put it that way, it sounds kinda-"

"How  _dare_ you!" she snarled, digging her claws into the table. "Do you have any idea what most of my children would give to have a real family to go home to?! To even have that option?! And you so easily toss that privilege aside over...over nothing more than pride and petty ideology! You disgust me as a father, John Wilde!  _Get out of my sight!"_

The other crime lords gaped at her openly, having rarely seen Lady Lang even raise her voice, let alone go on the kind of tirade they had just witnessed. The wolfess herself had already calmed down, merely simmering now instead of boiling over. She seemed to have heeded her own demand by simply refusing to look at the fox a second longer.

John stood rooted to the spot for a long while, petrified with shock and horror. "No…" he breathed. "You can't  _all_ reject me! I-I don't have anywhere else to go!"

"Nevertheless, it appears we have come to an agreement," Vladzotz said bluntly. "You will have to find another way to support your son."

"No!" Tossing all semblance of dignity and shame to the wayside, John flung himself to the floor on his paws and knees. "Please! I can't fail him again! Nicholas needs help! If not for me, do it for his sake! I'm begging you here!"

The crime lords' respective bodyguards growled and went on alert. John Wilde was committing a major breach of etiquette by continuing to grovel after already being rejected. Not only was it disrespectful, it was just plain embarrassing to look at.

Unsurprisingly, Lady Lang was the first to lose her patience, still not so much as actually glancing in his direction. "Felix, please remove this stain from our host's carpet."

"Yes, Miss Lang."

John only ceased groveling when his head was forcefully lifted off the floor and a sharp knife was put at his throat. "Perhaps I should gift our host with a free drink as well."

"That is one dark child," said Vlad.

"I noticed," Lang replied.

"Wait."

Felix's paw was stayed, respecting the authority of a crime lord even if it wasn't his own. But if Lang outright ordered him to kill the whimpering fox, no force on Earth would save him. "Yes, Mr. Big?"

"I have reconsidered my stance on the matter," the shrew said, looking down at John. "Given your dire circumstances, and knowing now that none of my fellow lords are willing to help, I might be persuaded to give your boy a chance after all."

"Really?" John asked, smiling up at him through watery eyes.

"Really?" Koslov asked, grimacing at the fox with clear disdain.

"Really," Big answered. "Not for free, of course. I know that you are lacking in funds, so I will be taking possession of your 'Suitopia' business and any other assets you leave behind. Don't expect me to go easy on your boy either. This is a hefty burden you are placing upon me, and I will treat him hard, but fair. If Nicholas is as talented as you claim, then I should hope he presents no problems for me."

Koslov grunted in displeasure, but otherwise did not object.

"Oh, thank you! Thank you!" Felix had no sooner stepped off of John's backside when the fox once again broke etiquette and started kissing Mr. Big's small paw loudly and repeatedly.

"Alright, this is disturbing."

"May I escort scrawny fox from premises?" Koslov asked.

"That won't be necessary," Big replied, leaving the bear noticeably disappointed. "This is not our property after all."

"Indeed," Vlad said. "Sprock, Russ,  _you_ get him out of here."

The badger and raccoon grabbed John by the back of his suit and started literally dragging him away. "Okay, that's fine!" he called out. "Oh, but you're going to need this!" He quickly dug into his front pocket and pulled out a key that he tossed in Mr. Big's general direction, making Koslov once again tense up for nothing. "That's the key to my cabin in the Rainforest District! Just so Nicholas has somewhere to stay! But don't tell him I set this up! Also, he eats most fish and bugs, but he also really likes blueberries! And he uses a #2 fur brush for his personal grooming! And he's good at math, so maybe involve him with stuff like that! And-"

Mercifully, he left everyone's hearing range soon after.

"Well, that was annoying," Preston said bluntly. Everyone else nodded in agreement.

"I hope you know what you're doing, Big," Lang said bitterly.

"Not entirely, but I hope it to be a worthy investment. I trust this will not impact our business agreement?"

"I will treat the boy with respect should I ever meet him. It's his father I take issue with." She looked away. "As for his mother...I will look into the matter further."

"Even Mr. Narwhalter finds this to be a questionable parenting strategy, but that is outweighed by his relief to not have to listen to it anymore."

"I keep forgetting you're even here, honestly," Preston admitted. "Shame that Serena had to bail out though. I like her just fine without her own bundle of joy around."

"A dreadful business, to be sure," Vlad said sardonically. "Now then, shall we move on?"

"Yes. Mr. Narwhalter would like to get back to that business about-"

"Anyone else?" Lang asked quickly.

"Actually, there is something else I wanted to bring up," the bat lord replied, suddenly growing more serious. He glanced over at the sole empty seat. "Have you ever heard of the Felidae Infernum?"

Preston snorted. "Of course. Who hasn't?"

* * *

_Still 20 Years Ago_

"And get him a Rabbik's cube or something! He enjoys mental stimulation! Maybe physical stimulation too when he's older! And-yaaaaaaaagh!"

That was the sound of Russ and Sprock tossing John Wilde out the door and onto the hard ground. "Ow...okay then! Just let Mr. Big know all of that, alright?"

His only answer was a pair of heavy doors being slammed behind him.

The middle-aged tod stood back up, dusting himself off as best he could. With a big brown stain now on the front of his suit, it hardly did any good. He pulled off his glasses, seeing that they had been cracked in the impact. Finding a clean piece of his suit, he wiped them off, creating just enough of a shine that he could see his own reflection for an instant.

He wasn't pleased by what he saw. "Who am I kidding? Lady Lang was right. I'm a disgrace of a father."

He didn't know what to do anymore. As Honest John, it had never been much of a question. He'd survived on his own, learned the ways of the world, and led a pretty successful life. That all changed once he got married. Not that he ever regretted getting involved with Marian, and certainly not getting to raise Nicholas, but it had been a challenge sometimes, and not a challenge that he was always able to overcome.

He'd never realized how cruel this city could truly be to foxes until he'd had others to protect from it. Yes, he could survive on his own just fine. Even this humiliation he could eventually bounce back from. But Marian had always been naive, adorably so he had to admit, and Nicholas still had so much to learn from him that he'd never gotten the chance to teach. Protecting his family from society's hatred had been somewhat of his life mission for a long time now.

Which was only a problem because he'd failed so utterly at it.

He couldn't teach Nicholas everything he needed to know, he could never convince Marian that he did need to know it, he couldn't start his tailoring business without relying on his old connections, he couldn't keep Nicholas from being traumatized by those awful Junior Ranger Scouts, he couldn't keep Marian from throwing him out, he couldn't stop Nicholas from running away, and had Mr. Big not had a change of heart at the last second, he couldn't even keep a roof over his head anymore.

That had been far too close for comfort. John didn't even want to think about what could've happened to his son had he not done what he did, and even then, he had almost failed. If he had, there was nothing he could do about it either. The fate of his own family was now completely out of his control.

John Wilde refused to accept that, and that refusal would drive everything he did for the next twenty years. "Then I'll just have to be a better father," he said to himself like a mantra. "A  _stronger_ father. A father who is  _always_ in control. A father who won't let society  _or_ the crime lords walk all over him anymore. Yes...that's the kind of father I'll be…heh heh...ha ha ha ha…"

Chuckling to himself, John Wilde turned his back on the imposing castle and walked away, ideas already flooding through his mind. He would find a solution to this problem, as he always did. By any means necessary.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not the longest drabble so far, but definitely one of the biggest. Bordering, in fact, on being too important to relegate to a drabble at all, but when it comes down to it, everything you've just glimpsed about Reynard's backstory has already been explained by the fox himself. Granted, the plan at the time was to have him go to each of the crime lords individually to get shot down, but we also wanted to have a drabble about a crime lord meeting to show them all actually interacting for once, so this became a case of hitting two drabbles with one update.
> 
> Once again, Vladzotz Fangpyre, Castle Fangpyre, and Russ and Sprock all belong to Upplet, who also provided some of the descriptions and dialogue for them. Preston Thornbrush and Sandcat Serena belong to myself, by virtue of their current incarnations being too young to have been active twenty years ago. That's something that we in the industry call "emergency character creation."
> 
> But like I said, the next update will be the main fic again. While still not required reading, expect this drabble, and the last one, to be...relevant.


End file.
